Illinois newspaper directory. History of the Illinois press association

Illinois Newspaper Directory and Historyfor his service he is entitled to them and if not, why not? In some cases I find our publishershave not informed themselves as to what some prices should be. I have foundsome printers who are also publishers who have figured costs on production for years andonce in a while some who cannot even start to figure costs. Fourth, in our work we talkco-operation with the other printers and publishers of the city or county, and then comesthe crowning feature of the whole situation, organization. Without organization coupledwith co-operation in the several localities, the printing business is difficult, but with thesetwo things it becomes an easy and more profitable matter."In my rounds over the state I have come across publishers and printers who wereonly too glad to give me one or two hours or even more time, from their busy day, todiscuss their difficulties and problems as well as the cost of production, but after all itwould be hard for them to put into practice some of these things discussed without theother publishers and printers co-operating with them to do so. Very seldom did we finda publisher or printer who did not favor a county or city organization, but the difficultygenerally was found to be the — unbelief in the other publisher or printer. In many placesreports were made like this 'We had a good county organization at one time and then"so and so" took advantage of us and cut the price and since that time we have had noorganization.' No doubt that just such a thing happened, but the difficulty in theorganization was the failure to call that publisher or printer into account as to the reasonfor price cutting. In one instance I could tell you about, in which it appeared there wasa cutting in price made by a certain printer, it was found on investigation that his pricewas fully up to standard and any printer in the county would have been glad to havehandled the job at his figures when the transaction was understood. Too many times wehave little misunderstandings and in place of getting together and clearing up that misunderstandingwe pile one upon another until we have a mountain out of a molehill.Getting together is organization and co-operation."One of the things I found in visiting the several offices was the great sympathysome publishers had for the city, township or county in which they lived. Some publisherswere handling legal notices, financial reports, assessment lists and such things athalf or less than the lawful price. A couple of publishers even took us to task for sponsoringbills in the legislature like the ones passed at the last session saying that we were a set ofrobbers getting exorbitant prices for publication. I wonder how many of these publishershave had any reduction in their taxes either in city, township or county becausethey were such good fellows. I am also wondering how many other men working for thecity, township or county presented their bill for service at half the established price?Many publishers and printers lose sight of the fact that it is not the cost of productionjust at the time of setting up but the lost time, that part of the business which cannotalways be accounted for on paper. Statistics have proved to us that in the printingbusiness we lose more than one-fourth of our time. Who is going to pay for that if itis not charged on the time of working? Organization and co-operation among the publishersand printers would very suddenly change the fellow who is not getting the priceson these things he should to the fellow getting what is coming to him."For fear that you might think that I have taken advantage of you to 'preach organizationand co-operation' I will give you some cold facts as to what I have done duringthe time I have served you as field secretary, which might be summed up as follows:"I have visited nearly five hundred and fifty newspaper and printing offices, aboutone hundred and twenty-five of which were printing offices alone. This has covered aterritory of seventy-two counties and in all of these counties to the best of my knowledgethere are less than fifteen offices I have not visited.270