Football tab thread 2012

[HejiraHenry]

Did I miss this? Have people quit doing them or are there just not any interesting stories this year?

We navigated our 48-page tab fairly well this time around. Plenty of advance planning, just a few miscues down the stretch in pulling it all together and the pages were all sent back a full day (!) ahead of the press start.

Best of all, I didn't paginate the damned thing. I took our lead desk guy, sicced him on that and I worked his night shift for a week. My problem is that I'll start out strongly, do 8 great pages and then get bored and struggle the rest of the way.

I gave my guy a week to get it done and a strong incentive - he could have off from the time he finished until the start of his shift on Tuesday this week. He wrapped up on Thursday and got a heckuva good long weekend before football starts this weekend.

Best of all, ad sales exceeded our projection by several thousand bucks.

 

[pressboxer]

I wrapped up the last of my preview stories more than a week ago and apparently was the only guy on staff to get all copy in by the preliminary deadline. My reward for doing so? "Hey, remember that feature we said we weren't going to need? We're going to need it."

Fortunately, I had already done the interviews and conducted the necessary research (and still had everything in the system), so it only took a couple of hours to slap the story together.

Since we went to a central desk (only about 400 miles away) a few years ago, we don't have to deal with layout. Of course, this has led to such problems as a 2A school being placed in the 3A section (screwed up the page count for both) and one of our little-bitty six-man teams being left out entirely (fortunately, another little-bitty six-man school wound up cancelling its season because of low numbers, so things worked out on that one).

The big production issue came to light last week when someone figured out the pages were a half inch narrower than we were originally told. This forced the cutting of every story that had to hold to one page. The guy who has the area beat was still bitching about it Saturday even after the SE told him multiple times that the decision was made higher up the chain and we'll just have to live with it.

 

[bumpy mcgee]

We're way behind from where we were last year at this point, but it's only Monday so it's still early for me to ***** too much. Come see me Thursday though, I'm sure I'll be ready to punch something/someone.

 

[Cosmo]

We haven't had a tab in four years now. Advertising claims they can't sell it. We run our high school previews in a countdown in the daily, 15 to 1. College previews follow that. The only problem is with this is that our centerpiece is defined for 15 straight days. No real leeway if something else big breaks or if someone has a fantastic feature worthy of centerpiece treatment. Get in line behind the prep previews.

 

[HejiraHenry]

We haven't had a tab in four years now. Advertising claims they can't sell it. We run our high school previews in a countdown in the daily, 15 to 1. College previews follow that. The only problem is with this is that our centerpiece is defined for 15 straight days. No real leeway if something else big breaks or if someone has a fantastic feature worthy of centerpiece treatment. Get in line behind the prep previews.

I'd have to fire me some salespeople. What part of the country are you in?

 

[dirtybird]

Did I miss this? Have people quit doing them or are there just not any interesting stories this year?

We navigated our 48-page tab fairly well this time around. Plenty of advance planning, just a few miscues down the stretch in pulling it all together and the pages were all sent back a full day (!) ahead of the press start.

Best of all, I didn't paginate the damned thing. I took our lead desk guy, sicced him on that and I worked his night shift for a week. My problem is that I'll start out strongly, do 8 great pages and then get bored and struggle the rest of the way.

I gave my guy a week to get it done and a strong incentive - he could have off from the time he finished until the start of his shift on Tuesday this week. He wrapped up on Thursday and got a heckuva good long weekend before football starts this weekend.

Best of all, ad sales exceeded our projection by several thousand bucks.

How soon does football start for y'all

 

[dog eat dog world]

We have five college teams, NAIA to D1, and a few years back quit doing a college tab because advertising couldn't sell it. So they said.

 

[HejiraHenry]

Did I miss this? Have people quit doing them or are there just not any interesting stories this year?

We navigated our 48-page tab fairly well this time around. Plenty of advance planning, just a few miscues down the stretch in pulling it all together and the pages were all sent back a full day (!) ahead of the press start.

Best of all, I didn't paginate the damned thing. I took our lead desk guy, sicced him on that and I worked his night shift for a week. My problem is that I'll start out strongly, do 8 great pages and then get bored and struggle the rest of the way.

I gave my guy a week to get it done and a strong incentive - he could have off from the time he finished until the start of his shift on Tuesday this week. He wrapped up on Thursday and got a heckuva good long weekend before football starts this weekend.

Best of all, ad sales exceeded our projection by several thousand bucks.

How soon does football start for y'all

We have an almost-full slate of games this Friday, Aug. 17. Too damned early, by at least a week, but that's the way it is.

 

[JackReacher]

I don't miss high school football season in the South. Those people are lunatics.

Friday nights on the desk were a rush, for sure. There was definitely a sense of accomplishment when the madness was over. But then, I was like....what exactly did I just accomplish? Other than waste precious bar time taking call-ins from Joe Schmo, who may or may not have given me accurate scores and stats?

 

[HejiraHenry]

I don't miss high school football season in the South. Those people are lunatics.

Friday nights on the desk were a rush, for sure. There was definitely a sense of accomplishment when the madness was over. But then, I was like....what exactly did I just accomplish? Other than waste precious bar time taking call-ins from Joe Schmo, who may or may not have given me accurate scores and stats?

You did your job.

 

[Bubbler]

Our tab was cancelled at the last minute. We've had an on-again, off-again situation with tabs.

There are regions of the country where I can see them not selling. I'm in one of them.

 

[JackReacher]

I don't miss high school football season in the South. Those people are lunatics.

Friday nights on the desk were a rush, for sure. There was definitely a sense of accomplishment when the madness was over. But then, I was like....what exactly did I just accomplish? Other than waste precious bar time taking call-ins from Joe Schmo, who may or may not have given me accurate scores and stats?

You did your job.

The best part of Football Fridays were when the prep guy and myself made our weekly run to Chick-Fil-A for dinner before the madness began.

 

[Cosmo]

We haven't had a tab in four years now. Advertising claims they can't sell it. We run our high school previews in a countdown in the daily, 15 to 1. College previews follow that. The only problem is with this is that our centerpiece is defined for 15 straight days. No real leeway if something else big breaks or if someone has a fantastic feature worthy of centerpiece treatment. Get in line behind the prep previews.

I'd have to fire me some salespeople. What part of the country are you in?

Central Va. Not the deep South, but football-mad enough that there shouldn't be a problem selling a prep tab.

 

[TheHacker]

I don't miss high school football season in the South. Those people are lunatics.

Friday nights on the desk were a rush, for sure. There was definitely a sense of accomplishment when the madness was over. But then, I was like....what exactly did I just accomplish? Other than waste precious bar time taking call-ins from Joe Schmo, who may or may not have given me accurate scores and stats?

You did your job.

The best part of Football Fridays were when the prep guy and myself made our weekly run to Chick-Fil-A for dinner before the madness began.

We used to do this at one of my previous stops, but we didn't settle for fast food. Ponderosa steak and the salad bar ... almost made standing outside freezing your ass off covering high school football tolerable. Almost.

 

[SportsGuyBCK]

We haven't had a tab in four years now. Advertising claims they can't sell it. We run our high school previews in a countdown in the daily, 15 to 1. College previews follow that. The only problem is with this is that our centerpiece is defined for 15 straight days. No real leeway if something else big breaks or if someone has a fantastic feature worthy of centerpiece treatment. Get in line behind the prep previews.

I'd have to fire me some salespeople. What part of the country are you in?

Central Va. Not the deep South, but football-mad enough that there shouldn't be a problem selling a prep tab.

How many schools in your coverage area?

I agree ... you got some ad sales people (and an ad director) who should be thrown through the door if they can't sell a football tab in your neck of the woods ... yeah, there are some areas where it wouldn't sell, but you ain't in one of them ...

 

[HanSenSE]

No tab, but we launch an 8-part preview series tomorrow. Got 5 in the can, now we're attacking the outlying precints. Season starts Aug. 24. Worried mostly about production issues, since they tucked my section inside the A section (don't get me started) and someone's gonna whine about deadlines. Fine ... I'll fill the first Friday night with pennant races, go out for a few beers at 9:30 and let someone else worry about the calls!

 

[JackReacher]

I don't miss high school football season in the South. Those people are lunatics.

Friday nights on the desk were a rush, for sure. There was definitely a sense of accomplishment when the madness was over. But then, I was like....what exactly did I just accomplish? Other than waste precious bar time taking call-ins from Joe Schmo, who may or may not have given me accurate scores and stats?

You did your job.

The best part of Football Fridays were when the prep guy and myself made our weekly run to Chick-Fil-A for dinner before the madness began.

We used to do this at one of my previous stops, but we didn't settle for fast food. Ponderosa steak and the salad bar ... almost made standing outside freezing your ass off covering high school football tolerable. Almost.

Chick-Fil-A >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Pondegrossa.

 

[young-gun11]

I'm throwing together my 19-page preview this week (probably more like this weekend...) and doing it alone. This is the time of year when it becomes really hard to do my job as the sports department.

 

[Cosmo]

We haven't had a tab in four years now. Advertising claims they can't sell it. We run our high school previews in a countdown in the daily, 15 to 1. College previews follow that. The only problem is with this is that our centerpiece is defined for 15 straight days. No real leeway if something else big breaks or if someone has a fantastic feature worthy of centerpiece treatment. Get in line behind the prep previews.

I'd have to fire me some salespeople. What part of the country are you in?

Central Va. Not the deep South, but football-mad enough that there shouldn't be a problem selling a prep tab.

How many schools in your coverage area?

I agree ... you got some ad sales people (and an ad director) who should be thrown through the door if they can't sell a football tab in your neck of the woods ... yeah, there are some areas where it wouldn't sell, but you ain't in one of them ...

15 high schools, plus three Division I universities (one FCS, two FBS). Plus heavy interest in other statewide FCS programs. No doubt we should be able to sell it.

 

[scottwcoleman]

Our tab was just thrown together haphazardly for the past few years, so ad sales were mediocre at best. We completely redesigned it this year and gave the sales reps a rough mock-up with more details on what was going to be included and so far numbers are about 10% over budget a little more than a week left to sell. We sold premium ad spots on specific school pages, which was new here (my idea since that gave me the chance to place most of the content and photos in advance instead of rushing to place goofy ad sizes at the end). All I have left to do is grab team photos and wrap up coach interviews during media days which are scheduled this week and next. A steak dinner is definitely on the menu next week when it's off to the press.