Two newsrooms producing 18 weekly print publications have been brought together in a “renewal” at US east coast publisher Straus News.

The 78-year-old privately-owned group covers Manhattan and Orange counties in New York, Sussex and Passaic counties in New Jersey and Pike County, Pennsylvania. It has a total of 17 local news editions, both weekly print and digital publications and the “environmentally-themed” Dirt magazine.

Previously, two distinct newsrooms worked separately on content for the publications – which have more than 150,000 subscribers – and their corresponding daily digital editions.

Problems in coordinating the team of ten editors, five designers and 20 correspondents have been resolved with a cloud-based Protecmedia system, bringing print and web workflows together.

President and publisher Jeanne Strauss says benefits have included the ability to optimise editing the same news for several publications, which had previously been duplicated and performed manually. The “perfect tool” also works on both web and print content, delivering a better user experience.

Journalists also gain the flexibility to complete their work from any device and place.