The Anatomy of an Express Cover

So we chose this Associated Press story for tomorrow’s cover about how the poor state of the economy is forcing cash-strapped families to postpone gift-giving until they can hit the crazy post-holiday sales. The piece described how some parents will be leaving notes from Santa on Dec. 25 instead of gifts, so one of our designers came up with the idea for a cover image depicting the plate for Santa’s cookies left behind with a sad memo in the crumbs.

He promptly grabbed leftover cookies from our holiday potluck on Tuesday and descended to the photo studio. The office agreed it was a quick, creative solution, but there was some concern: Were the crumbs left by hungry children who couldn’t resist, therefore having to leave Santa an IOU? Why would Santa eat the cookies and not leave presents? Would people see it as ‘104’ instead of ‘IOU’?

In the end, the concept was nixed. But we couldn’t let all those cookies have been crumbled completely in vain. And it’s certainly not the last imperfect cover idea we’ll kill — and share with you.

40 Notes/ Hide

  1. laure-70-ilg442 reblogged this from expressafterdeadline
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  3. pioneerman reblogged this from imwithkanye and added:
    Indeed.
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  10. shortformblog reblogged this from imwithkanye and added:
    Today in telling folks how the sausage is made — or more correctly in this case, how the cookie crumbles. Expect more...
  11. imwithkanye reblogged this from expressafterdeadline and added:
    Attn: Pioneerman.
  12. expressafterdeadline posted this