As the new vice president of production for News Publishing Company, Doug Crow is charged with making sure all pre-press, printing and post-press operations are working as efficiently as possible and that all print products are of top quality.
"We strive to put out the best newspaper possible," said Crow. "We're utilizing technology to produce the most efficient newspaper possible as well."
Crow joined the local newspaper company in September 2007 as corporate compliance officer. He came in on the heels of the installation of the new $2.35 million 15-unit Dauphin Graphic Machines state-of-the-art press at the Rome News-Tribune. He starting working with press crews on fine-tuning printing processes to maximize color reproduction on the press and make related work processes more efficient.
The goal was to open up windows of time that would allow the company to add more commercial printing of other newspapers and products.
The new press helped with that because it added computer-to-plate technology, eliminating a step in the process. Previously, newspaper pages were photographed onto film, which was used to burn the plates that go on the press to print the paper. Now plates are made from digital images of pages straight from the computer.
"We're ahead of the game technologically compared to most newspapers. It really is impressive the amount of advance technology a newspaper of this size has," said Crow.
Now that the workflow of advertising, news and pagination has been tweaked for News Publishing Company's nine newspapers and multiple specialty publications, the opportunities to add more commercial printing have increased.
NPCO already prints the Pickens Progress and new contracts are in the works.
"To get more print jobs and maximizing the use of the new press is the goal," said Crow.
Crow also oversees all NPCO facilities.
At 42, Crow has spent most of the life working at newspapers. He started as a youngster.
"My brother and sister and I had paper routes," said Crow. Then he worked for his local paper opening mail and other part-time duties as a teen. Over the years, he worked in different departments and continued to move up as a leader in the company.
Prior to joining NPCO, Crow was operations director at the Daily Breeze in Torrance, Calif., and a 22-year employee of Copley Los Angeles Newspapers. As special projects manager there, Crow successfully co-lead the outsourcing of the printing and inserting of all Copley Los Angeles publications. His tenure with Copley included stints as circulation project manager, transportation department assistant foreman and accounting clerk.
Crow's wife, Cecilia, is the classified advertising manager of the Rome News-Tribune. They have a 13-year-old son, Alex.