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West Branch Communications adds two publications in Linn County
News · January 16, 2015
The owners of the Mount Vernon-Lisbon Sun and West Branch Times have purchased the Linn News-Letter and Linn County Shopper, weekly publications covering northern Linn County and located in Central City.
Jake Krob and Stuart Clark purchased the business from Kathy Brockman. Kathy and her husband, Dick, owned the paper since 2004. Dick passed away in April 2013.
All current staff remains at the paper, with Rae Ann Holub continuing as editor.
“The Linn News-Letter has been a community icon in northern Linn County for more than 125 years,” Krob said. “We’re excited to take it over and continue the legacy of the publishers who came before us.”
The new owners have a lot of faith in small-town papers.
“Our newspapers have strong readership and solid advertising,” Krob said. “People continue to turn to us for their local news. And businesses recognize we offer an efficient, effective and affordable way to market their products and services.”
The News-Letter joins a family of six other small-town weekly newspapers Krob and Clark own together. They include the West Branch Times, West Liberty Index, Mount Vernon-Lisbon Sun, Marion Times, Solon Economist and North Liberty Leader. They also publish the weekly Sunlight shopper in the Mount Vernon-Lisbon area, and the monthly North Johnson County shopper, Robins Community News and Hiawatha Today. Another regular publication is the Marion Today, published about 10 times a year. Clark is the sole owner of the Tipton Conservative and Clarence Lowden Sun-News, which are also weekly newspapers.
With the addition of the News-Letter and Linn County Shopper, Clark and Krob’s publications reach 20,200 households each week. Add in the monthly publications and distribution exceeds 50,000.
Although they operate a growing newspaper company, Clark and Krob are committed to publishing autonomous newspapers.
“The News-Letter should reflect the community it serves, just as the Mount Vernon-Lisbon Sun reflects its community,” Krob said. “That’s why we’re pretty hands-off with management. We believe in hiring good people and letting them run their shows. They know their communities better than we do.”
In fact, Clark and Krob are working editors. Clark covers the goings-on in Tipton; Krob does the same in Mount Vernon-Lisbon.
Clark grew up in the newspaper business, with his family owning the Tipton Conservative. After graduating from the University of Iowa, he began working at the Conservative in 1978. He purchased the paper in the early 1980s. He and his wife, Sharon, live in Tipton. They have two grown children, Erin and Eric, and one grandchild, Eliza.
Krob, a Tipton native, began his newspaper career in Minnesota after graduating from Buena Vista University in Storm Lake in 1997. In 2001, he and Clark formed a partnership and bought the West Branch Times, and Krob moved there. He’s lived in Mount Vernon for 10 years with his wife, Niki, and their seven children, ages 19 to one month.
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