Silence can speak volumes. At one point during this year's annual NAA/Canadian Pulp and Paper Association/American Forest and Paper Association newsprint conference, the million-dollar question was raised: Which of the newspaper executives present were contemplating web-width reductions?
Plenty of whispers and furtive glances followed--but no hands. "No one's going to say anything in this crowd," muttered one paper-industry executive.
It was the most tense moment during an otherwise cordial meeting between publishers and papermakers that came during a less-than-cordial time in their relationship--a fact underscored by a recent U.S. Justice Department inquiry into newsprint pricing. Still, publishers and newsprint manufacturers agreed that their fortunes are linked and that partnership remains the best route to reducing market volatility.
Troubling predictions abounded. As analysts warned that global fiber shortages will likely continue, papermakers reiterated that they have no plans to increase capacity. "We can't justify expansion in a contracting market," explained James L. Burke, president and CEO of Southeast Paper Manufacturing Co., pointing to newspapers' diminishing circulation.
Another long-discussed prophecy, that of using alternative fiber sources for newsprint, appears to be gaining momentum. Vancouver-based Arbokem Inc. plans to test a mix of wheat pulp and ONP with two California publishers early next year. Long-time kenaf crusader Donald N. Soldwedel, chairman of Western Newspapers Inc. of Yuma, Ariz., secured initial funding for a Texas kenaf newsprint mill. A project involving corn fiber is also in the works, and even papermakers grudgingly agreed that tight fiber markets may make such alternatives viable.
Though few in the audience were willing to discuss their own web-width plans, Richard J. Vezza, president and CEO of North Jersey Newspapers, handed out the conference's hot souvenir: a copy of the North Jersey Herald & News of Passaic, which switched to a 50-inch web on Oct. 2.
Some weren't impressed. "Does such action breed confidence in our medium's future?" asked John Stewart Bryan III, chairman, president and CEO of Media General Inc.
"Contemplating it and planning to do it are two different things," said Dick Diamond, publisher of the Staten Island (N.Y.) Advance, answering the million-dollar web-width question. "A lot of people are looking at it."
Mark Toner covers technology and new-media issues for Presstime magazine. E-mail, tonem@attmail.com; phone, (703) 648-1111.
©1997 Newspaper Association of America. All rights reserved.