Perhaps you saw my advertisement in the San Bernardino Sun this morning.
Thanks for taking the time to look me up.
Since nobody bothered to tell you what happened to me, my wife thought I should take out an ad in the paper. I thought it was worth the $83.40 investment to update The Sun’s remaining readers.
I was fired by The Sun after 31-plus years there. I thought I would be a lifer, and would have been proud to be one, but then the industry went into a tailspin and I was a big loser in the Game of Favorites with current editor Steve Lambert.
If you want to read about my “separation” at length, go to the very first entry in this blog.
Anyway, I’m not dead. Yet.
I don’t know what I’m doing next. Career-wise. Looking at this or that opportunity, writing in this blog … but mostly just chilling out after 31 years of never taking more than two weeks off at once. I’m into Week 4 of retirement, or unemployment, and this not working thing … so far I kind of like it.
Do you know the government will give you money for not working? “Unemployment,” it’s called. I suppose I was aware of this in a vague sense, but having never been unemployed … I didn’t think I ever would get into the system. Now, I run to the mailbox every day waiting for my first check. Well, I don’t really run to the mailbox because I still don’t really believe anyone will give me money for not doing anything. What a concept. (Although since I’ve been paying unemployment “insurance” for 31 years, I guess it’s my money anyway.)
I’m glad you’re here. Feel free to check back as often as you like. I won’t be doing as many Inland Empire-specific items as I once did, since I don’t work there anymore, and I’m hoping for a readership outside the I-10 corridor I’d kept uppermost in my mind since I was a know-it-all college kid with his first journalism job, back in 1976.
The old-timers among you may be interested in a series I’m doing on former Sun co-workers, one for each year I worked at the place. Some of you may remember Claude Anderson, for example. Again, check the blog history for those items … and more are coming — 29 more, actually.
OK, funny story. Part of the reason The Sun is in such dire straits (or at least Steve Lambert claims it is; I think that was his official reason for firing me, since “competence” couldn’t be the answer, not after 31 years of personnel evaluations so glowing you’d think they were radioactive) is that the paper apparently doesn’t want to take advertisers’ money.
True story of the genesis of the ad you saw:
My wife, whose idea the whole thing was, called up the advertising department at The Sun to place the ad you saw this morning, on page C5 …
(This, after trying to place an ad on-line. Apparently, you can’t do that. And why should you be able to? This internet is still a new technology, after all.)
Then she called the office and told a person in advertising she would like to place an ad. Apparently, it happens so rarely these days it threw the people there for a loop.
The woman said, “What kind of ad?”
My wife said, “A display ad.”
The Sun woman said, “A classified ad?”
My wife said, “No, a display ad.”
The Sun lady said, “What company?”
My wife said, “For myself.”
This seemed to baffle the ad woman. My wife could hear her shouting, “Can anyone take an ad?”
She transferred my wife to someone named David. He was more helpful, but he had real trouble grasping that my wife didn’t want a classified ad, but a display ad. Eventually, he seemed to wrap his mind around it, but then he said he didn’t have a “rate” card and would have to look up the price. After a bit of a lag, he came back with the cost for a one-column-by-one-inch ad. My wife thanked him and said she would get back to him. He gave her his name and contact numbers, making him potential Employee of the Year in the ad department.
A week later, my wife called back and asked for David … and she was told he “wasn’t in today.”
My wife said, “Is there someone else who can help me?” And explained what she wanted to do.
The woman said, “No. You have to call back.” At no point did the woman ask for a name or number in case, you know, the ad people wanted to call back and maybe take some money from this over-the-transom advertiser.
The next day my wife called, got David, reminded him that they had spoken the week before, and he was less than helpful. To the point that I’d think a lot of potential advertisers would have hung up and called the Press Enterprise. (Oops. There goes Ad Employee of the Year.)
“What is the name of your company,” he asked.
My wife said it wasn’t for a company, that the ad was something she wanted to purchase for herself.
He said, “Hold on a minute” and transferred her. (Breaking a batch of ad-department protocols, no doubt.)
Next on the line was someone named “Miguel.” My wife began the story from the beginning. A Sunday ad. She would pay for it up front. Miguel kept saying, “What company is this for?” She said it was just for her use. Miguel couldn’t grasp this.
Finally, my wife gave in. She gave Miguel the name of a relative’s company, so Miguel could “create an account.” She gave him a batch of business information that had nothing to do with the intent and origin of the ad, and Miguel said he would have to get back to her once the account was created.
My wife said, “Hey, can I get this in the Sunday paper? Can I give you my credit card number now?” She knew the deadline was looming. So, on offer, Miguel took the credit card number. He said he would call back, and meanwhile my wife e-mailed him the ad, which she had created herself on the computer. It was ready to go; she just had to e-mail it to the paper. The Sun people didn’t have to lift a finger … aside from opening an e-mail attachment and billing the customer.
A few hours later, he called back and said the account “wasn’t set up yet” but that the ad could get into the Sunday paper. Miguel wanted to know if he should call back when the account was set up, and my wife said “No, as long as it runs on Sunday.”
She never heard from him or anyone else in the ad department again … but the ad appeared today … which is why some of you are reading this.
Said my wife, when it was over: “I’ve never worked so hard to get someone to take my money.” She also noted that at no point did anyone in advertising seem interested in selling something to her, getting multiple days out of the ad or offering to publish it in other L.A. News Group newspapers. Nothing.
And there is part of the reason newspapers are dying. Yikes.
Excuse the long digression. Thanks for checking out my site. It’s a bit primitive now, but I’ll add some bells and whistles as I go along.
Feel free to come by and chat or just look around. If you don’t want to post a comment, you can e-mail me at: Paul@Oberjuerge.com. My absence might have seemed a little weird to some of you … or maybe you didn’t even notice. But I’m still here, banging away.
Just not in the paper I gave the first three decades of my working life to.
12 responses so far ↓
1 Wenalway // Apr 7, 2008 at 8:23 AM
At many newspapers, the ad people are the most inefficient in the building. They come in “around” 9, leave promptly at 4:55, and certainly DO NOT work OT or weekends.
Their concept of work during that time is merely the act of being present. They do not improvise; they do not assist in any area that might be deemed “someone else’s responsibility.”
The act of putting out a newspaper is beyond their comprehension. They think the stories write themselves and simply flow onto the pages of their own volition. In their world, the newsroom staff could be cut to a very tiny number, thus freeing up more profits to flow into their own pockets. (Never mind they did no work to justify that cash flow.)
The best part: These people eventually move up and become the people who DO the slashing in the newsrooms!
2 Gina T // Apr 7, 2008 at 10:37 AM
Paul, I should mention that when I was still there, I had to field a number of calls from Spanish speaking customers because, for a time, they had no one who could speek Spanish in the circulation or the advertising department.
At least twice over my four year “stint” there, I took a message and then tried in vain to reach someone at the other departments. It was the most frustrating thing. But the good thing was that I at least left the Spanish speakers with a good impression of editorial by trying to be helpful.
3 sun reader // Apr 7, 2008 at 8:19 PM
Paul,
I read The Sun every day and am acquainted with some of their staff. Your account of the ad process seems highly doctored, and full of obvious bitter feelings, though you insinuate some type of righteousness in yourself that you are above it. Your inability to relay the facts to readers is perhaps why you are a columnist and not a reporter. Thank god for the institution of newspaper that has several filters required to validate information before print, rather than this blog where anyone(including myself) can just post something and if it isn’t contested, just gets passed off as truth. I hope your ‘fans’ also consider the possibility that you are in fact “full of yourself”, “arrogant”, “would walk past you like you were the dirt under his feet”, and “overpaid”, as those are just a few of the things your beloved ex co-workers may feel. Nearly all of the comments posted here are in obvious support of your work and full of disappointment in The Suns decision to let you go. I certainly admire the fact that you are well regarded by the community in that sense, but you lost a bit of credibility with me by your inappropriate attacks on a local institution and your integrity left the building as quickly as you and your cardboard box did. Best of luck in your future.
4 Mike // Apr 7, 2008 at 8:40 PM
What do you think the odds are that “sun reader” is actually someone who works in the sun’s advertising dept. 100 out of a 100, maybe?
5 DNAE // Apr 7, 2008 at 10:55 PM
I’m an advertising account executive at that other LANG newspaper, the Daily News — and if you want to buy an ad, please call me — I’ll hook you up. You really want to make an impact — for a great rate? Let’s talk “print & deliver” inserts — what zips do you want? 10k minimum. Online? Red Plum? Let’s go! Cash in advance? No problem! You want “efficient”? Call me — I need the revenue, and so does the newspaper. Yeah, I’m in at 8:30am and out by 6:00pm — but ya know what? What I do pays for “putting out” the newspaper — so instead of snarky swipes at AEs (who don’t even have a voice in print) — tell me what you want and when, give me what I need to deal with Credit, and you’ll see your ad in the newspaper — just like every other legit advertiser you see in every edition.
6 DNAE // Apr 7, 2008 at 11:29 PM
And this to WENALWAY: I’m not defending the ad rep’s performance on booking Paul O’s ad — sounds pathetic, but who knows? But you might want to consider that part of the AE’s problem might have been the fact that Paul actually called-in to place an ad. Do you think this happens every day? Are you really so naive as to think that we AEs do “no work to justify that cash flow”? Do you think that just because the newspaper exists, businesses automatically beg to run ads? Wake up! We work to keep the accounts we have, and to earn new business. I’ve got one big account that used to run once-a-week. Now he’s dropped one of our competitors and is up to five days-a-week with DN. Another account has dropped his campaign with one competitor and stayed even with another — and increased his advertising with DN. And guess what — it has very little to do with the journalism. Yeah, we have a good newspaper and good readership. But when it comes to gaining or losing revenue in a market like this one — it’s about the effort, the service and the relationship that the AE’s maintain with the advertisers. This isn’t rocket sci or world peace, but hey — don’t disrespect the department that pays the bills. Like the articles — advertisers don’t just happen by themselves. And you know what? I’ve never heard any snide comments in our department about the editorial side. We like the newspaper, and we’re pretty damned proud to represent it to the business community. DNAE
7 Guy McCarthy // Apr 8, 2008 at 8:56 AM
I didn’t see Sunday’s paper, so I missed the ad. If you have any spare copies of that print edition I’ll buy one off you for 20 bucks.
Guy McCarthy
Redlands, Calif.
8 Paul Oberjuerge // Apr 9, 2008 at 10:24 AM
Guy
There is a link to the ad at the bottom of this post now.
9 Paul Camp // Apr 10, 2008 at 5:17 AM
I have worked in the newspaper business all of my adult life. I believe your account of your wife’s attempts to place her ad is chillingly accurate, a scene repeated daily at newspapers throughout the country. Newspapers face huge challenges on many fronts, not the least of which is the fact they have been habitually taking money from customers for so long that they no longer possess the skill of convincing potential NEW customers of the value of their product and making the process of placing an ad simple, quick and painless.
Best of luck in your new role as a blogger.
10 Wenalway // Apr 14, 2008 at 2:32 PM
DNAE: That assessment was based on multiple experiences with the ad types, many of whom went out of their way to make editorial’s job harder by not doing their own properly.
And if people are finishing their work and leaving at 6, then that’s their privilege. If they’re leaving with work unfinished, then that’s a major problem.
Finally, these beancounters and job slashers generally are not coming from the newsroom side. These ad-department-raised, dollar-focused publishers certainly don’t have much knowledge of how a newspaper should work. “There came into Egypt a pharaoh who did not know …”
11 Silver Streak // Apr 27, 2008 at 10:16 PM
To the ad sales people who posted earlier.
Read the March 11 blog entry. Ask yourself if anybody would make such posts honestly about people in LANG management.
One of you is proud to represent the paper before the business community. Check the circulation figures, and then have your resume prepared.
I hope you are as good at your job as Paul O was at his. Somehow, I doubt that.
12 Barbara46 // Oct 22, 2009 at 1:21 PM
We have new found strengths and reasons to face the task with optimism and have discovered that there are more things we want to learn together, for the youth and for ourselves. ,
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