New Work for Media General Plant, Architect

By: E&P Staff Now in somewhat smaller dimensions, pages of Media General's twice-weekly Eufaula (Ala.) Tribune are rolling off a new press.

Late last month, The Tribune and The River Rambler were moved from the Dothan Eagle printing plant, approximately 50 miles to the south, to the Opelika-Auburn News, about 60 miles to the north.

In late 2006, the O-A News opened a $14 million plant and office, each approximately 20,000 square feet and designed by Dario Designs, Marlboro, Mass.

The plant's $5-million-plus Manugraph DGM press provides the Tribune with improved print quality and additional color photos and ads.

The office building houses a complete television studio that allows breaking news to be broadcast live on the newspaper's partner, WRBL-TV 3, in nearby Columbus, Ga.

Tribune General Manager Ed Trainor is quoted by his paper saying that "after just two weeks at our new printing site, I am pleased to note that despite the fact that this process is ripe with potential for technical glitches we have not encountered any significant problems."

O-A News architect Dario Designs, meanwhile, reports that it has signed contracts with five media/printing companies to conduct consolidation studies and operational analysis.

Still under nondisclosure agreements, the projects (including two outside the United States) include analyzing the potential for centralizing operations among several newspapers and evaluating options for outsourcing production to sister papers and to newspapers and/or commercial printers under different ownership.

The firm also was hired for masterplanning and strategic planning on three other projects.

While architecture and engineering work on U.S. media facilities has slowed, Dario Designs Vice President David Ehrhardt said in a statement. "the overseas work has picked up." The new work, he added, brings the number of 2008 new projects to 28, "with our total number of active projects still exceeding the 50 mark."