Why is the paper smaller than usual?
The number of news pages is determined in large part by the number of advertisements purchased and by the volume of news. Both tend to be lower in summer and right after the first of the year. The newspaper tends to grow larger, with more advertisements and more news space, in the fall — the fourth quarter for retailers and the most important quarter of the year for many. Without ads to pay for extra pages, The Oregonian conserves newsprint by keeping the papers smaller unless more space is needed for important news events. Newsprint is the largest expense after payroll at The Oregonian. Editors regularly monitor whether the volume of news requires a different proportion of news to advertising than is typical. For the papers of Sept. 12, 2001, for instance, the newspaper added more than a dozen pages clear of any advertising to accommodate full coverage of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks on the United States. Similarly, when the Iraq war began, editors added a separate section of eight
