A very wise old editor - in fact the man who hired me more than three decades to work at this lovely old newspaper - once gave me a sage piece of advice.
"Whatever you do," he counseled me, "don't ever (mess around) with the comics." Only he didn't say it in such politically correct language.
He had spent the day being berated by readers who were irate over changes the newspaper had made in the comics pages.
I know how he feels.
I spent my day yesterday doing the same. It wasn't fun, but it was enlightening. In fact, I'd go so far as to say it was rewarding. It reminded me, once again, how loyal our readers are. How much they love this thing they hold in their hands every day. And how loathe they are to see anyone tinker with the product.
So they were less than thrilled yesterday when they ventured out into the bitter cold to get the newspaper off their stoop, or in the Wawa, and turned to their favorite pages, the comics and puzzles.
They did not recognize what they saw, and they were not happy. The funnies? Not exactly. They were fuming.
The idea behind the pages was something that is happening a lot in our industry. We were trying to consolidate some of the traditional newspaper functions, arriving at a consensus for pages that could appear in more than one newspaper.
It sounds a lot easier to do than it is. I learned that yesterday.
In particular, I learned this: Size matters. And I didn't learn it from my wife.
I learned that after dealing with scores of calls from frustrated readers who were at their wit's end trying to deal with the changes that had affected their cherished morning pastime, the Crossword, the Celebrity Cipher (Cryptogram) and the Sudoku puzzle.
Our loyal, longtime readers share something in common with those rare animals - some call them dinosaurs - that cling to this notion of printing ink on paper. They are, in large part, an older demographic. They have been customers for decades. They don't particularly like change. Many of them don't have much need for computers. They pick up the newspaper, check the obits to be sure their name is not listed, then beging their morning ritural, devouring their daily dose of local news. Then, usually with a second cup of good, strong coffee, they indulge themselves in the puzzles that we print every day.
Only yesterday we made that pleasure something less that what it usually was, something - literally - yes.
Something else you should know about newspaper readers. They are an opinionated bunch. They like the opinions they read in the newspaper every day, and they're not exactly shy about sharing them.
Yesterday, they lit up our phone lines and email accounts to let us know they were not thrilled with the changes we had made.
Their voices registered loud and clear.
I particularly liked the style shown by longtime reader Carolyn Shaw. "Sorry, but I left my microscope at the high school," she lambasted me in an email message. "That's what I would need to see and use the Sudoku in today's paper. Same goes for the Crossword puzzle and the Celebrity Cipher ... Guess I'm just an old fuddy-duddy but I like the way it was set up before."
If you are in fact a fuddy-duddy, Carolyn, I'll proudly join the group.
The sentiments were repeated all morning.
"Are you kidding!!! We need a magnifier to see the cryptogram and crossword. Older folks read your paper and what we don't need is smaller print."
Many indicated that if the puzzles were not changed back, they will have purchased their last Daily Times.
I always find talking to readers to be enlightening. After all, it's their newspaper. I'm just the steward. Yesterday they wanted to tell me that I had violated that sacred pact between the reader and the newspaper.
The day was eye-opening to say the least. And, in a way, therapeutic. The newspaper industry is struggling as it looks to reinvent itself in a world forever changed by technology.
We now live in two worlds, our old print world, which we continue to serve, and the digital world where we deliver across multiple platforms 24 hours a day.
Bridging those two worlds is not always easy.
But I took something else away from all the conversations I had with readers yesterday. Invariably, every one of them could not have been more polite. They were concerned about something they consider an integral part of their lives. Sure, they didn't like the changes, but they also were eager to learn about why we were making changes and the other convulsions my industry is undergoing.
And, as always, the conversations included the single sentence I have heard more times than any other since I walked into this building 31 years ago.
"I have been reading your paper since it was the Chester Times."
We heard you.
Today we have restored the puzzles to a size I hope you will find more conducive to your morning rituals.
It cost us a couple of comics, and that is something we will have to live with.
That old editor was right. Again. Don't ever mess with the comics pages.
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