Momma don’t let your babies grow up to be community newspaper owners. To say the last few weeks have been a challenge would be the understatement of my professional life.

It all started on May 14 when I received an e-mail from Postmedia informing me that Flyer Force would be ceasing operations by the end of June. Flyer Force is the company that was responsible for delivering your flyers every week and this paper every two weeks.

After getting over the initial shock, I immediately started looking into having the paper delivered by Canada Post, which provided me with an even bigger shock when I found out how much it would cost.

But that was just the start. Canada Post has very strict guidelines on the weight and size of what you can send through unaddressed Community Mail. One of the key ones requires that the paper be folded in half and measure no more than 12 x 6 inches in order to avoid having to pay a surcharge for over-sized mail.

The also have a weight limit of 50 grams. One gram over and you move up to a higher rate, which won’t be a problem for anything under 28 pages. It’s when the paper is 28 pages, or higher, that the rate goes up.

Since I had to shave an inch off the height of the page to get the paper down to 11.5 inches, I figured I could a 28-page paper under 50 grams. I thought wrong. This week’s paper, which is 28 pages when you include the L’Orléanais, weighs exactly 50.18 grams.

Having to fold the paper in half presented a different problem. For the past six years the paper has been printed at the old Ottawa Citizen building in the west end.

As it turned out, they didn’t have the ability to fold it in half which meant they I had to find a new printer.

That was on June 1. The very next day, on June 2, I received a second email from Postmedia informing me that Flyer Force had moved up their final date from June 30 to June 22, which gave me less than a week to find a new printer and figure out how to get the paper to our readers.

After meeting with two printers in Montréal, I settled on Hebdos-Litho in Saint-Leonard. Unfortunately, there are no more web presses in Eastern Ontario any more except for the one at the old Ottawa Citizen building, but its days are numbered as well.

In the past five years, web presses have been closed in Carleton Place, Hawkesbury and most recently Winchester, leaving Toronto as the lone city in Eastern and Central Ontario with a press.

So that takes care of printing the paper. My next challenge was distribution. It might come as no surprise to anyone that Canada Post is a very expensive service, even when it comes to delivering unaddressed bulk mail. In fact, if we were to mail a paper to every resident in Blackburn Hamlet and Orléans, our distribution costs would more than triple, making that choice financial inviable.

Therefore, we’ve come up come up with a hybrid model that combines Canada Post delivery with pick up locations across Blackburn Hamlet and Orléans and home delivery for those people who don’t mind paying a small fee to get their paper.

We’ve also launched our “Friends of the Orléans Star” program which provides those people who wish to do so the ability to provide a voluntary contribution to the paper either on a monthly basis, or as a lump sum.

Part of the benefits of being a silver or gold level member, is guaranteed delivery of the Orléans Star and the L’Orléanais to your door.

This week and this week only, the paper is being delivered to almost every home in Blackburn Hamlet and Orléans at a significant cost, as a way to get the information out there.

Moving forward, the paper will be delivered by Canada Post to a vast majority of the homes in the K4A, K1C, K1E and K1W postal codes. But not everyone will be getting their paper in the mail.

If you live in one of those areas, you have the choice of dropping by one of our many pick-up locations that includes all four local Metro stores, the two Sobeys stores, the Canadian Tire store on Innes Road, and Marsha’s Your Independent in Orléans Garden, or you can arrange to have the paper delivered to your door for a small fee which will be used to help pay our carriers.

If you wish to arrange to have the paper delivered to your door, or would like to be notified when the paper has been dropped off at our 30+ pick up locations across Blackburn Hamlet and Orléans, please e-mail me at fsherwin0713@gmail.com.

You can find a list of the locations where you can pick up copies of the Orléans Star and the L’Orléanais on page 14 of this week’s paper. The paper will be available at the pick-up locations starting on July 8 and every two weeks afterwards. A complete list of the locations can also be found at orleansonline.ca and orléanais.ca.

I do have one special favour to ask. If you are getting this paper for the first time in months, or even years, I’d love to know about it.

(If you wish to comment on this or any other View Point column please write to Fred Sherwin at fsherwin@orleansstar.ca)