If you’re too young to recall, Minnie Pearl appeared for decades on the Grand Ole Opry and Heehaw. When Sarah Ophelia Colley created Minnie Pearl, by accident she left a price tag on Minnie’s flower-bedecked hat. Later, Colley decided that the price tag was essential to Minnie’s countrified character.
In this issue of The Sopris Sun, we’ve put price tags on stories, features and photos because they’re essential to our character — and our survival. It’s true: your generosity is essential to our keepin’ on keepin’ on. And, because we’re the kind of nonprofit that’s committed to transparency, we think our readers should know what this “free” newspaper costs.
With the season of holiday giving right around the corner, you’ll see that we’ve put price tags on some of our stories, features and photos to show you why your support is so crucial to The Sopris Sun.
And it’s no accident that we asked Carbondale’s super-volunteer Carol Klein to model our Minnie Pearl get-up on the cover. Volunteers, in-kind donations, and your story ideas, letters, and feedback, as well as greenbacks themselves, are the lifeblood of this nonprofit community newspaper.
Like all newspapers, The Sopris Sun depends heavily on advertising to pay our staff and cover our rent, printing costs, and other bills. But as a nonprofit, approximately 15 percent of our $252,000 annual budget must be covered by donations from individuals and businesses.
We’re extremely grateful for the generous support of so many donors who have contributed already in 2017, but we still have a way to go to reach our $20,000 individual and business fundraising goal by the end of the year (another $7,500 to be exact)*. If all our regular readers who have not yet made a contribution donate before December 31, we can easily reach that goal. Might you be one of them?
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It takes community support to keep The Sopris Sun shining.
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