Publisher's Point Of View
Robert Allan Hooftallen

I was talking with a friend recently who was packing his bags for a trip to Key West. He had no choice. His brother was getting married on the beach. His goal was to exchange vows "with his toes buried in the sand."

I don't know the groom, but I certainly respect his style. But that's another story.

We made a lot of vacation small talk while he prepared his golf clubs and other warmweather gear. In the middle of it all, he stopped and with an almost-desperately serious look on his face, he said, "I just need to get out of town, man."

And while I hadn't thought of it that way, those words describe exactly how I've been feeling - I just need to get out of town for a while.

Luckily, that's been in the cards for several months. The next two weeks are the ones my family uses as a reward for surviving the previous 50.

And while I'll be 1,300 miles away from this spot in which I sit, the most challenging issues I face here will, at a minimum, sporadically hound me for answers.

But, that's okay. The change in latitude won't singly provide answers, but it will alter my perspective and, moreover, remind me of the things that really matter to my family and me.

We vacation at this time every year in Florida. Every year we can less "afford" the trip, both from a monetary and a time perspective. But for what it does for our relationship as a young family, those things are secondary and we always conclude that we can't afford not to go.

When we leave, it always seems like a foolish thing; as if the challenges here take some kind of precedent and that we ought to face them down and then plan our trip. We are either spontaneous enough not to care about that, or wise enough to know that trips planned when all your problems are solved, are trips that never take place.

This year, the number of pressing decisions are fewer, but the subject matter seems, at least on the surface, to be more serious.

The biggest among them is the direction of this growing newspaper. And while the details are not so easily explained, the business plan is: we'll continue to expand into the Potter County market and work our tails off to improve our service to both markets.

The bottom line is that newspapers everywhere are making adjustments to their traditional operations to meet the continued decline of their products and services.

In short, newspapers that aren't finding new ways to market their products and services are not doing so well.

What that means to us is that we don't believe a one-county specific newspaper that provides traditional newspaper services can survive financially.

The parent corporation of this newspaper, Endeavor Media, was named as such because from the very beginning we believed that a traditional newspaper had no chance at long-term survival. We knew that we would have to provide a wider range of media services or go the way of the passenger pigeon.

In four years, we've built a newspaper, purchased a digital print company and, essentially combined their forces. This from two people who had never been in business before. And we've suffered the consequences of that fact for 1,000 days. We're getting a handle on things.

And now we are focusing on opening a second office, this one in the former Take II Video building in Coudersport. Our projected Grand Opening there is Friday, April 13. How fitting.

So my wife and I carry those things with us as we point our truck south and begin a journey that we have only taken before by plane.

Our kids will only care about being "there yet."

My wife and I will relax, and re-exchange our vows on the beach of Florida's Sun Coast. We think that's a good way to prepare for another couple years of madness.

Oh, and one last thing: We'll be opening a completely new business that will enter the Endeavor Media fold.

Stay tuned… please.