I’ve worked for New Times, Creative Loafing and the Boston Phoenix, but CL was the best.
I remember my first impression of the Weekly Planet from my interview at the office in Ybor City. The office furniture looked like it had come from the local thrift store. During the interview I learned that the entire production design team had just been told their jobs would be “centralized” in Atlanta. Despite honest warnings of low morale and high tension, I accepted the challenge to be operations manager which led to the titles of general manager and finally, publisher. From that first centralized production project there were so many more to come: zoned editions, name changes, consultants, a few web and print redesigns, outsourced classified sales, in-house classified sales, Best of the Bay issues, major community events like Beerfest and Sensory Overload, and an office move to a one-room South Howard warehouse location with no working plumbing (during the same week of our Summer Guide issue!).
There were never deep pockets or the financial resources we really needed to pull anything off. But with extreme over-confidence from a group of scrappy, strong-willed employees, we pulled everything off. No matter what was thrown at us, the paper always came out. It wasn’t always pretty, but it was pretty fun. I miss my Weekly Planet/Creative Loafing family, but I have an entire t-shirt quilt made from the many shirts commemorating just a few of the things we accomplished. I live in New England now and work with two former “Loafers,” proving that the alt-weekly world is a small world. I’ve taken with me the ability to weather many corporate changes in stride and still remind myself on stressful days, “the paper always comes out.”
Cheers to my fellow Loafers!
Amber Abram worked at the Planet/CL from 2001 to 2007. She is now director of digital programs at Ettractions in Boston.
This article appears in Apr 18-24, 2013.