Thank you for another year!

At the first of every year we hold our subscription drive to encourage more readers to support our local newspaper.

Some of the readers have asked: “Why should we subscribe when we can get the newspaper free?”

That’s a logical question considering today’s economy. Thirty dollars for a whole year is a real bargain, since the Post Office charges almost that much to deliver the paper.

Many people pick up the paper at one of the free drops which we have in town, and that is fine if all the free copies aren’t gone by the time you get there.

Paid subscriptions are used as a guide for advertisers who want to know how many readers they can depend on seeing their advertisement. Despite what many of you think, advertisers pay for newspapers, and if you see their ad in this paper, then please thank them personally because they keep us in business.

This is our 48th year in business and as publisher for all those years, we want to thank you for keeping 25 people employed.

As publisher, at the age of 75, I have tried to retire many times, and I have also tried to hire my replacement. The first time was back in 1998 when I was going to sail around the world.

The day before I was to leave, the whole printing plant burned down. It would have been a good time to take the insurance money and run, but I heard myself telling the employees we would rebuild bigger and better.

That was the time we offered life time subscriptions for $100. We raised $10,000 and the money was needed, however more importantly, we needed to know that we were needed.

Well back to work we went. One year later we actually bought a boat and sailed down the coast to Mexico and we took our readers with us. We have been sailing in Mexican waters every winter since.

In 2004, we once again officially announced our retirement and set up a Board of Directors to run the newspapers. The plan was to give active employees stock in the corporation so it would eventually be employee owned.

There are pitfalls in such a plan. As one person once said to us, “No business can be run by a committee.” Even a board needs to have a chairman. We still have a Board of Directors made up of active employees and they do most of the hands on operation of the business, however, in these difficult economic times it takes super human ability to keep our newspaper business above water.

With serious cuts in every phase of the business we have managed to survive another year.

This year we face more postal increases and at the same time we are told the delivery may get even slower. If that happens we will look at other methods of delivery.

For now, we will be mailing your local paper every week for the nominal fee of $30.

Please give us your support.

As long as I am able, I promise to keep you informed about our own community in a positive manner.

I promise not to pass off my opinion as real news.

I promise to keep our legislators aware that they represent real people in small communities like ours and not special interest groups who pay them off in political donations.

Thank you for another year.

Sincerely,

John M. Derby, publisher