Editorial

For 117 years, The Cullman Times – under a variety of nameplates – has been a vital part of our community. Generations of Cullman County residents and beyond have turned to this newspaper’s pages as the community’s leading information source. Today, the legacy of trusted local journalism continues.

While The Times’ mission to serve our audience at the highest level remains, we are announcing a change in your newspaper delivery starting Tuesday, April 3.

At that time, The Times will shift from 6 to 5 days-a-week delivery with its first weekend edition, a combined Saturday and Sunday edition, publishing on Saturday, April 7.

Additionally, on April 3, we will move from independent contractors who currently deliver your newspaper each Tuesday through Sunday morning to the United States Postal Service for same-day Tuesday through Saturday mail delivery in Cullman County. The current subscription rates, which have not increased since 2015, will not change.

Factors dictating this conversion include changing newspaper advertising trends due partly to more online shopping, rising federal tariffs on newsprint and the evolving habits of our audience related to information consumption via the internet.

Today, many of our customers find The Times’ online content, including the delivery of our digital e-edition (a replica of the print edition), breaking news alerts and a daily newsletter, better for their lifestyle.

The Times is enjoying its largest audience ever. In addition to thousands of print readers, each month an average of more than 141,325 unique visitors go to our digital platform – cullmantimes.com – via desktops, laptops, tablets and mobile devices. In January, unique visitors increased 5.4 percent compared to January 2017.

In the past 12 months, more than 6.5 million page views were logged on cullmantimes.com. In addition to readers, many advertisers are expanding their buying commitment to digital to reach The Times’ growing local audience. The Times also has 34,223 Facebook and 8,777 Twitter followers, which boosts its social media audience to one of the largest in the Cullman market.

Similar to many Alabama newspaper markets, the growing digital analytics has forced us to examine all aspects of our operations. Currently, newsprint costs are second only to payroll when calculating this newspaper’s expenses. The delivery costs related to the print edition is another major expense.

We understand the delivery by the postal service will impact the reading habits of some of our print subscribers, but to assist in this transition, we encourage subscribers to sign-up for the digital service, which is part of all subscription packages. The sign-up process is easy and ensures early morning delivery of the e-edition to your digital device.

Print subscribers who take advantage of our Total Access program enjoy unlimited print and digital access to our e-edition and 24/7 digital updates. On days with print editions, subscribers can opt to read the e-edition on their digital device, which is also convenient while on vacation or away from home. Once you activate a digital account, each publishing day, you will receive an early morning email notification that the e-edition is ready.

Those audience members who already subscribe to digital-only access will not experience any change in service.

Additionally, our digital breaking news alerts and daily newsletter are free to anyone with an email address, simply go to cullmantimes.com and sign-up.

The Times print edition will still be available Tuesday through Saturday mornings in single-copy outlets at stores and newspaper racks throughout Cullman County.

For those who value the current Sunday advertising inserts and the money-saving coupons, those advertisements will shift to the Saturday weekend print edition.

As we move forward, The Times staff is committed to serving you at the high level you expect. It’s our privilege to keep you informed about your community via our print and digital platforms today and in the days, weeks, months and years ahead.

We value our partnership with all readers and advertisers, and if we can assist you in any manner, please contact us at 256-734-2131 or email me at tconnor@cullmantimes.com.

Please know that every member of The Times team and I thank you for allowing us the opportunity to be Cullman’s No. 1 information source.