Just a few years ago, I pondered whether I really needed a building for our publishing company here in Guthrie County. Now I own two buildings.
When I bought the Lake Panorama Times, we published the newspaper out of our office in Johnston. We did not have a physical location in Guthrie County, and we didn’t seem to need one. We outsourced our printing, we didn’t sell subscriptions or classified advertising, and our staff worked mostly out of their homes. As such, we didn’t see a need to set up a shingle in town.
When I bought the Times Vedette, I had a change of heart, and we decided to continue the lease that the previous publisher had on the building, at least for the time being. I still wasn’t sure we needed a physical office, as I could count the number of people who walked through the door each week on one hand. Even so, we were expanding our staff, and I wanted a place where we could be together and work as a team. Not too much later, I purchased the building we were leasing at 111 E. Main St. in Panora, which has been the newspaper office for decades. We cleaned it out, gave it a fresh coat of paint inside and out, had a new awning mounted and had several new windows installed.
Throughout this time, I was also interested in purchasing a storage building. Unfortunately, there were not many options. Then, a few months ago, I learned that a building in Guthrie Center at 104 Industrial Road may be up for sale. This nearly 14,000-square-foot facility had office space built inside of it that fit our needs better than what we had and provided massive amounts of space with overhead doors for storage. Even better, it had the building height and electrical capacity for printing and finishing equipment, if I chose to pursue that down the road. I ran some numbers to see if we could make this work, and I made an offer to the Guthrie Center Economic Development group, which owned the building and was leasing it to a tenant that had vacated the building. Within a short time, we agreed upon the price and terms.
So, I now own two buildings in Guthrie County. We will be operating the Guthrie County wing of Big Green Umbrella Media out of the Guthrie Center office, and I am exploring options on what to do with the Panora building, which include selling it, leasing it, creating an extension of our current business, or launching another business and running it out of the space.
We are in the process of making stark improvements to the Guthrie Center building, which you will notice soon.
Meanwhile, regardless of where the physical office of our publishing company is located, our commitment to our readers and advertisers will be strong, and we will continue to invest in Guthrie County.
Please note that our mailing address will remain the same at P.O. Box 38, Panora, IA 50216. Our physical street address is now 104 Industrial Road, Guthrie Center, IA 50115. And our new office phone number, as of Thursday morning, will be 641-332-2707.
We are in the process of moving equipment and having services transferred this week, and we would be naïve not to expect a few hiccups. Please be patient with us as we work through this transition.
We look forward to continuing to serve you in even bigger and better ways.
Thanks for reading.
Shane Goodman
Editor and Publisher
Times Vedette digital editions
shane@dmcityview.com
641-755-2115