As the press crews produced Sunday's Calendar section last Thursday morning, someone posted this movie ad on the left side of the delivery table.
Flyboys on a printing crew were at the mercy of the crew, if the crew liked you, life was good. If not, you had very few breaks from the roar of the printing presses.
Back in the day a printing crew consisted of (1) Press Operator (2) First Color (3) Second Color (4) Top Oiler (5) Bottom Oiler (6) Tension Man (7) Top Floor (8) Bottom Floor (9) First Apprentice (10) Second Apprentice (11) Flyboy
When running in double delivery mode, an offside Flyboy was added. And when there was more than one spot color, you would have an apprentice as an ink pourer. Life as a printer was good.
In today's world we have crews of five and six people, with everyone but the press operator making the same wage. The press operator's earn $4.00 per hour more than the journey person's.
Back in the seventies the printing presses were eight units, with two pair of form plates. Today the presses have twelve units, with five of the units capable of running full color. We also added another set of form plates about twenty-one years ago, so life as a pressperson can be very busy most of the time.
Before the Internet hit the media so hard quality was our main focus, today profits control what we allow to our subscribers, and is tracked by the amount of waste we generate.
I feel it's time to take a step backwards, and focus on quality again.
Goodnight,
Edward
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3 comments:
Rember when We washed our own blankets before we went to lunch ? The Paper looked alot better.
just a little factor called pride... Humm.
but we could never do that again or we would never have time for lunch.
Because we dont have enough staff to do the job corectly,and on time. I will still awalys do my best ,that i can. But like most I realy just dont care anymore. because the tribune cares nothing about The TIMES.
I agree with Don
When Tribune took control of The Times in 2000, there were almost 700 pressroom employees between the 3 plants. Today there are approximately 280 of us left in 2 plants.
Even though "paid" circulation is down, we are still printing over a million copys a day with less than half the staffing of just 6 years ago.
More units to strip, plate up and wash. More rolls to hang and make-up.
The presses also grew! When unit 12 was converted into a 4-high back to back, we were not given any more staffing.
Don't think that Tribune can't cut anymore. There is no secret why Jeff was asked to resign,
MORE CUTS ARE COMING!
Are there any Toy Companies looking for property in Orange County?
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