The Astorian tells the stories of the North Coast in words and images.

Every business has a 2020 story.

The Astorian’s reads a lot like others who have made changes in response to the impact of coronavirus restrictions. A downturn in revenue meant that in March we laid off employees, reduced hours, sent people home to work remotely and applied for a Paycheck Protection Program loan to cover lost revenue.

What happened then was a renewal in our conviction that local news is essential — and appreciated.

Our operations improved as we focused remaining resources on keeping our employees healthy, our community informed and taking care of our customers.

We received donations and support from subscribers and community members who recognized that credible, relevant local news is vital to an informed community, and there is a cost to produce it well.

From March to December of this year, subscriptions to The Astorian grew significantly, particularly digital subscriptions. Over half of our print subscribers are now registered to use our digital editions and apps, and 16% of our subscribers are digital only.

I’m tired of people parroting the narrative that the newspaper industry is dying. It isn’t. But it’s definitely changing. In many ways, we were fortunate that the events of 2020 moved those changes forward faster.

Today we really describe ourselves as a news organization, not a newspaper. Our content is posted online every day and at all hours, including video and spoken formats. Much effort is spent providing feedback to our news team on which content resonates with readers and how they find it, whether through newsletter, social media or search.

Subscriptions pay for the cost of producing the news, and we are focused on giving our subscribers their money’s worth.

We do allow all dailyastorian.com readers four stories a month without paying. During the beginning of the pandemic, our coronavirus coverage was outside of the subscription paywall so that critical public health and safety information was available to everyone. However, in December, we made the decision to put that section behind the paywall again, since the old stories belong in our archive of uniquely created local news. Archives are a privilege for subscribers.

Going forward, most of our reporting will be behind the paywall. We will make exceptions, like we always have done, for stories that involve imminent potential threats to public health and safety.

The other recent change to dailyastorian.com is that reader commenting is no longer a feature on our website. We are interested in hearing from readers, but we’ve found the best story feedback comes from direct interaction with news reporters, whose contact information is on every story.

There are new additions to dailyastorian.com, too. Daily interactive sudoku, crossword and word jumble puzzles are now online for subscribers at dailyastorian.com/puzzles. You can also listen to any story posted online, in English, Spanish, French, German, Chinese or Italian.

Timely digital products are important to our future, but that doesn’t mean The Astorian print edition will go away anytime soon. As of today, over 7,000 readers still want to read a print newspaper, and about 40% of those still don’t access the digital version. You’ll continue to see compelling features geared for our print audience, like Thursday’s 2020 review section of the community’s response to the pandemic.

Our mission remains to produce credible, trusted local news and information for our community. Our goal is to continually add more value to The Astorian subscription — in print or online.

If you are a subscriber, thank you for your support. As always, I’m interested in hearing more about what you want to see in your Astorian — print or digital.

Contact me at kborgen@dailyastorian.com or at 503-325-4955.