Combining the practical and emotional in the right proportions to achieve a goal or live a dream is an often-underappreciated human ability. For Jeremy Gulban, CEO of CherryRoad Media, and Lee Bachlet, COO of the media division, the combination of purpose and passion continues to energize their quest to stabilize, reinvent and innovate local news.
Gulban’s lifelong passion for local news was so strong that he relinquished his role as CEO at CherryRoad Technologies (originally DataStudy, Inc.), his family’s company founded in 1983, and launched CherryRoad Media in 2020.
“I’ve always been interested in news and information, politics and geography, which all align with the news industry. In prior years, but especially in 2020 with the pandemic, the industry was having a rough go of it, and I thought I could do something to help with my background in technology,” Gulban said.
Being a well-established, thriving business, CherryRoad Technologies had a strong management team, allowing Gulban to proceed with his passion project. Without the larger company’s financial and operational support and back-office and technology services, he doesn’t think he could have started CherryRoad Media from scratch.
Passion turned to purpose, as CherryRoad Media has grown to 93 news properties in 18 states, mostly in small, rural communities with circulations of less than 1,000. Many are former Gannett newspapers.
Bachlet’s passion for journalism and the news industry has served him well for over 40 years, with senior editorial and advertising positions at St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Austin American-Statesman, Las Vegas Review-Journal and Gannett, among others.
“I met Jeremy when I was senior group publisher for Gannett in Colorado, and he had purchased some Gannett properties in eastern Colorado. I saw what he was doing — trying to build something — to make a difference. I realized it was a different direction for me, but I wanted the opportunity to build something new,” Bachlet said.
Gulban’s and Bachlet’s purpose and passion for improving local news have impacted the editors of the newspapers CherryRoad has purchased. Kim Fleeting has been the managing editor of the Shawnee (Oklahoma) News-Star since 2015, transitioning from the previous ownership to CherryRoad in 2022.
“The purchase of the News-Star by CherryRoad came at a perfect time for us and helped us rejuvenate local news and show its importance in the community. It was inspiring that Jeremy, without much of a newspaper background, had such a passion for local community newspapers and wanted to make a difference. We felt his passion for journalism. It was definitely a new outlook, and the community noticed it when we started making changes,” Fleeting said.
Megan Pullyard is the editor of the Moberly (Missouri) Monitor-Index. After serving as the content coordinator for a local community magazine, Pullyard saw an opening at the Monitor-Index, which CherryRoad purchased in 2023. She became the editor in March 2024.
Meetings and workgroup sessions with other editors fuel Pullyard's passion for the CherryRoad mission. They discuss the contents of their newspapers and learn different methods to distribute content to their communities.
“CherryRoad’s focus is to keep the news local, and that’s my focus too, covering events in my county and surrounding counties that may not have a huge news presence. The CherryRoad support staff is wonderful. They’re always available to answer my questions and work very hard to create a positive work environment, even though most of us are working remotely,” Pullyard said.
Growth challenges
Gulban credits being new to the news industry and coming to it with a blank slate as both beneficial and the cause of many missteps. Many of the staff of the Gannett properties CherryRoad Media purchased wanted to return to a locally managed editorial and advertising sales model instead of Gannett’s centralized model.
“It was a mistake to listen to those staff members. We initially hired many graphic designers and others to fill local roles, but we realized it wasn’t very efficient. We went back in the opposite direction, outsourcing almost all of our graphic design and ad building and became more centralized. It’s a variable model: we pay for what we use and focus our energies on other parts of the business,” Gulban said.
According to Bachlet, a newspaper's two primary local functions are reporting and ad sales.
“We work on the concept that we can most efficiently handle everything else in a centralized space: circulation, obits, legals, classified, billing and other financial functions and distribution. We don’t need a circulation person in every market. We need reporters generating content and someone penetrating each market and selling local ads,” Bachlet said.
CherryRoad learned an important lesson when it wanted an advertising salesperson in every market. Gulban said they discovered only certain people can sell advertising, and good salespeople are reluctant to say they’re selling newspaper advertising.
“We’ve struggled to find quality salespeople in every market, so we’ve gone in the opposite direction and admitted we have 20 to 25 very good salespeople in the company. Can we have them sell in multiple markets? We know they know how to sell, and they’re dedicated hard workers. I’d rather do that than hire someone who looks good on paper but can’t sell and won’t be successful,” Gulban said.
Gulban added that most of the advertising at CherryRoad Media properties is migrating into special projects, such as a graduation edition, a sports preview and a county fair. It’s more like selling a product than an ad in a weekly newspaper, making it easier to move from market to market. The advertising model has changed and is more conducive to this approach.
Printing was another immediate challenge for CherryRoad. According to Gulban, all printing was initially outsourced, but then he noticed volumes and subscriptions were declining. Many TMC shopper products were eliminated because they were losing money.
“We decided to bring the printing in-house, and today, only 10 of CherryRoad's 93 titles are printed by a third party. There’s better control and more efficiency. We’re also considering using local digital printers to print very short runs since most of our titles are less than 1,000 copies. Even with cheaper paper, printing 500 copies on a web press is inefficient,” said Gulban.
The technology advantage
Despite the many challenges of rapid acquisitions and revitalizing local news and ad revenue, CherryRoad has a significant advantage over other newspaper groups: CherryRoad Technologies.
“It gives us development capabilities, expertise and resources that small community newspapers don’t have. Not only are we building a newspaper chain, but we’ve also built circulation systems, promotional platforms, websites and paywalls without paying a vendor, saving us money. That makes a big difference in our business model,” Bachlet said.
To assist its local editors in increasing digital content and interacting with consumers in the digital space, CherryRoad promoted one of its best editors to become the director of digital content. According to Bachlet, many of CherryRoad’s editors and reporters are used to a print-centric approach. He wants to flip the switch and become digital-first, with print as the culmination of all the digital work.
“Our focus on circulation growth is entirely digital. We’re realizing significant digital growth at a 40% rate in 2025. We’re confident we can increase that 40% by multiples. We’re working hard to make that transition and convince consumers of the value of a digital subscription with their local CherryRoad paper,” said Bachlet.
He added that another advantage for CherryRoad is its extensive history in managed services — working with owners who don't want to be actively involved in the day-to-day operations of their newspapers. It already manages several newspapers for El Rito Media in New Mexico.
Part of CherryRoad Media’s strategy is offering website development and hosting to local businesses through its newspapers’ ad salespeople. Gulban said convincing sales reps to sell those technology products is challenging.
“Another challenge is small business owners already have a website and don’t want to change it. We can show them there’s more value in utilizing their sites as part of their marketing strategy, more than just a technology application,” said Gulban.
This approach has been successful in Moberly, where Pullyard said the local Chamber of Commerce has purchased CherryRoad Technologies' services to run the Chamber’s website. Pullyard talked with the director in April, who is pleased with the website’s performance because it functions much better than the previous site.
On the ground in the heartland
The Shawnee News-Star is one of the few CherryRoad Media newspapers published on Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday. Kim Fleeting, a full-time news sports reporter, is kept busy reporting in the town of more than 30,000 and the surrounding counties.
“We’re writing more feature stories, trying to profile the interesting people in our community. We host a big Best of Preps awards banquet for academic and high school sports and athletics every year. Our summer magazine is a glossy — showcasing Shawnee arts and culture,” Fleeting said.
The community is the home of several Indigenous tribes, with the Citizen Potawatomi Nation (CPN) the largest. Fleeting added that the News-Star has great relationships with all of them. The News-Star collaborates with the CPN communications team for coverage and photos of its hot-air balloon festival every August and other year-round events.
Revitalizing an interest in the Moberly Monitor-Index was a challenge for Pullyard when she started as the editor and sole reporter. The trust in the local paper was dwindling due to the lack of local news being printed under the previous ownership. Moberly residents needed proof that they should subscribe again.
“I made it a priority to go into the community, meet current and potential subscribers and ask them what they want to see in their local newspaper. I have remained dedicated to writing only local content and have heard from several subscribers that they finally feel like they have their community newspaper back again,” Pullyard said.
Pullyard added that her priority is ensuring the print subscribers receive the news they want and writing stories to attract younger generations. Social media followers are much younger, and the paper’s online subscribers have steadily increased since she became editor and focused on a digital-first approach.
Gulban reports there are many opportunities to expand CherryRoad Media but is cautious because adding more newspaper properties could distract him and the team from moving forward in the markets where it already has newspapers.
“I feel very good about where we are from an efficiency perspective, which could benefit many other opportunities. But I don’t want to swamp the boat right now,” Gulban said.
Bob Sillick has held many senior positions and served a myriad of clients during his 47 years in marketing and advertising. He has been a freelance/contract content researcher, writer, editor and manager since 2010. He can be reached at bobsillick@gmail.com.
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