What is going on at the Blackfoot Morning News?

What is going on at the Blackfoot Morning News? Over the past couple months, nearly a dozen employees have been fired, or quit because they say they didn’t like the fact everyone was getting fired. People get fired. We get that. It’s a personnel issue.

Some employees are furious that inserts and magazines they worked very hard on, never got delivered. So the advertisers that bought space, did not get what they paid for.

“If you were to go into the mail room right now,” says former publisher John Miller. “You’d find pallets of publications that were supposed to be distributed up and down the Valley. Daytripper, Bingham Magazine and other publications that are sitting on pallets not being distributed.”

Miller was the editor of the Morning News. Getting fired he can handle. All the local advertisers not getting their money’s worth, that makes him angry.

“Pallets not even open. Advertisers are putting a lot of money into these and they’re not going out the way they were contractually told they’d go out. It’s ripping off local advertisers.”

Former publisher Aaron Mackley was fired in October. He confirms what Miller says. Advertisers paid for space in publications that are just sitting in the mail room. Like the Harvest edition of October 27th. Clients were told his paper would be seen by 7000 people in Bingham County, delivered right to their door. That never happened.

“The biggest ad I was paying attention to was to save the pool,” says Mackley. “They spent about a thousand bucks on this ad. The reason they did that, it would have been distributed to everyone in Blackfoot, whether they had a subscription or not. It was supposed to help them decide how to vote. It went out only subscribers. It was intended to non-subscribers. It didn’t have the impact and the vote failed. Whether it would have passed or failed we don’t know. The ad would have reached another 6000 people.”

Advertisers we contacted were extremely upset to learn the papers they bought space in were never delivered as promised.

“We’re devastated. We were advertising for welding positions,” says Premier Technology owner Doug Sayer. “We need welders. When you give someone your word, do what you say you’re going to do.”

Angela Clark of XII Stones Chevron agrees. “Well, it shows a lack of integrity. It makes us mad. These are not cheap ads and I’ve been billed for them.”

The paper in Blackfoot began as the Blackfoot Register, back in 1880.

“Been a paper in this town for 120 years,” says Mackley.

Miller adds, “I came to work here in 1994 when it was still owned by Mark Brown. His father before him. They had a reputation. A terrific reputation for fairness, accuracy, and customer service. People were treated fairly. We’re losing that. We’re going downhill.”

Both former employees would like to see the community start a new paper, run by local people.

“I’m hoping enough people in this county care enough to stand up and say we want a local paper,” says Miller.

We called Horizon Publications in Illinois and the corporate employee running the paper in Blackfoot right now. No calls were returned.