Charlottetown will soon be the hub of production for several daily newspapers and numerous weeklies.
Transcontinental Media, which owns The Guardian and The Journal Pioneer on P.E.I., announced Wednesday plans to centralize all page layout and ad building operations of its Maritime newspapers in a unique specialized centre that will be located in The Guardian building on Prince Street.
Guardian publisher Don Brander says the move represents Transcontinental Medias' goal to improve and simplify the technical aspects of the newspaper production, while increasing efficiency throughout the whole newspaper network.
Called the Centre of Excellence, the new centre will offer specialized services with state of the art equipment which will allow local newspaper employees to concentrate and focus on publishing and providing quality local content, while the technical aspects will be managed by the centre.
"On the production side, it just makes so many more efficiencies,'' said Brander, using as an example the number of times similar ads are handled in the different newspapers.
Sandy Rundle, publisher of the Journal Pioneer in Summerside, predicts the creation of the Centre of Excellence will be seamless for the reader.
"It is our hope and intention to allow the editors and the reporters and the publisher at the local level to have some more time on gathering local content and leave the actual pagination and the packaging of the paper to the pagination centre,'' he said.
In addition to his publishing duties in Summerside, Rundle will be responsible for the day-to-day operations of the Centre of Excellence.
Guardian managing editor Gary MacDougall says the move will free up editorial resources for more thorough reporting.
"We should be able to do a better job on content,'' said MacDougall.
The transfer of all the newspaper pre-press operations will be starting in March and should be complete by the end of the year.
Brander says staffing levels will increase at the new centre as the newspaper operations are gradually transferred throughout the year. The new positions created will be offered to the employees of the local newspapers holding similar positions.
"As always, Transcontinental Medias' commitment is to better serve their customers and stay ahead in an ever-changing market,'' said Brander.
"The creation of similar centres in other provinces has proven to be very effective, as the overall quality of the products improved significantly where processes were simplified.''
The centre will be taking over pagination and pre-press operations for six dailies in Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island plus approximately 20 weeklies and specialty publications from Nova Scotia and New Brunswick.
Transcontinental Media is the fourth largest media group in Canada, with more than 3,000 employees and annual revenues of $648 million in 2008.
... More on this story in The Guardian tomorrow.
