The Record from Hackensack, New Jersey • 168

BR-4 THE RECORD RECORD OF THE CENTUHT SUNDAY, JUNE 4. 1995 ecord grew along with North Jersey zd I HI At left, a bustling newsroom in the 1950s. Above, Malcolm A. Borg, now chairman of the board of The Record, checking on the latest transmissions from newspaper's wire services in 1966. Jul hfl H- Iff, iH li .1 te-M Vf- w' Ir-' 1 I From Page BR-3 The Record's board of directors elected Mac chairman in January 1975.

His father assumed the honorary title of chairman emeritus, which he held until his death in May 1975. That same year, The Record switched completely from a hot-type shop to cold type and computers. It was a precursor to the sophisticated technology that would soon retool The Record forever. When he became chairman, Mac made a commitment to the modernization of both the newspaper and the plant, which has made The Record a leader in the newspaper industry known for both its editorial excellence and its state-of-the-art production technology. "We sought the best because we intend to be the best," was how Mac described The Record's two-year, worldwide search for the finest technology.

In 1980, that technology was introduced as The Record installed a Swiss Ferag inserting and storage system a pilot installation in the United States which made the collating of advertising inserts and newspaper sections swifter. During the Eighties, the newspaper converted from typewriters to Atex video display terminals in editorial and computerized the entire newspaper operation. Construction was completed on an $8' million, four-story building to house two 41-foot-tall, high-speed offset TKS presses from Japan, and a four-story addition to the existing building and a third-floor corporate wing and business offices were added. The following year, a large rooftop satellite receiver was mounted, eliminating the need for teletype machines. And when the new TKS presses began running June 28, 1982, the conversion from letterpress to offset provided The Record with more color printing capability than existed at any other daily newspaper in the nation.

Early in 1982, Greg Borg sold all his stock to pursue personal interests, and a year later, both central New Jersey publishing companies were sold. At the end of 1983, a corporate reorganization established the new parent company of Macromedia Inc. as a holding company for the two independent, highly successful subsidiaries: Gateway Communications Inc. and Bergen Record Corp. The latter publishes The Record and The News Tribune, a Woodbridge evening newspaper, which it acquired in 1985.

In the late Seventies, The Record opened a Passaic County bureau that relocated to larger headquarters in Wayne in 1984. That same year, Time magazine honored The Record by naming it one of the top suburban newspapers in the United States. And in 1985, Mac Borg was named Editor of the Year by the National Press Photographers Association. The presentation noted that in the three years since The Record had begun using color presses, its color advertising linage had increased to give The Sunday Record the most color linage of any Sunday newspaper in the country. The late 1980s saw The Record convert from evening to morning delivery in 1988 and reintroduce a Saturday edition in 1989.

But though 1988 was the most profitable year in the company's 93-year history and plans were under way to build a satellite printing plant in Rockaway Township to relieve crowding at the Hackensack plant, the newspaper industry began reeling under a nationwide recession. From 1980 to 1992, 150 newspapers in the United States disappeared, mostly because of the economy. Between 1989 and 1991, The Record watched as $25.3 million in advertising revenues vanished during the industrywide recession. In 1991, The Record's bank loan was $102 million outstanding for construction of the Rockaway plant, which had been started just before the economy nose-dived and advertising revenues fell. The banks required that $17 million be repaid no later than June 30, 1992.

Meeting that reduction in debt was an impossibility, so in September 1991, the company announced the first layoffs since the Depression 60 years earlier. Also implemented were salary and hiring freezes, five mandatory unpaid vacation days, and a suspension of profit sharing and the 401(k) match. It became necessary to have a second round of layoffs in September 1992, with special early retirements, before an economic equilibrium was reached. With such stringent belt-tightening, that equilibrium was achieved. In fact, I I TERRENCE JAMESSTAFF PHOTOGRAPHER An editor and a reporter discussing a story In the newsroom today.

Computers are Integral to putting out the newspaper each day. I 1 1 -5-v. "ii 's fA fy The Record enters the digital era: Far left, the satellite printing plant In Rockaway Township, which opened in 1991. Left, Bob Terhune at the fully computerized electronic pre-press station. Above, top executives of The Record and its sis-ter paper, The News Tribune.

budgeted to bring in $13.7 million in 1995. The good news of that 1993 economic reversal was tempered by the death of Greg Borg in October of that year. He died of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (Lou Gehrig's disease) at age 54. Today, The Record is New Jer daily newspapers. And the family's involvement in the newspaper continues when Malcolm Borg's daughter, Jennifer, becomes the fourth generation of Borgs to join The Record on She comes to The Record after practicing labor and employment law for five years in also were reinstituted following a three-year suspension.

But most significant of all in The Record's economic recovery was the increase in advertising revenue and the substantial income generated by the Rockaway commercial printing operation. In 1993, Rockaway brought in $2.3 million in revenue, and it has been Record has become a leader in many categories of newspaper advertising linage, with special emphasis on full-color advertising. Though many other family-owned newspapers went under, the Borgs' Record came through difficult financial times to survive as one of America's, best regional revenue and third-largest in circulation. Its primary marketing area is Bergen and Passaic counties, with selected towns in Hudson County and some in Morris County that border on Passaic County. The paper's "hometown" of Bergen now has one of the highest concentrations of retail business in the United States, and The i The Record rebounded from the recession so well and reduced debt so significantly that by 1993 banks once again were eager to lend the newspaper money.

Employee profit sharing and the 401(k) match sey's second-lamest newspaper in New YorkCity..