Ad desk, step 5
Deadlines: two clocks, not one
Space closes first, materials close second, and Sunday closes before both. The desk assumes you know this; now you do.
Every insertion has two deadlines. Space: the date the paper must know your ad is coming and how big it is. Materials: the later date your finished file must arrive. Dailies commonly set space several days ahead of the run and materials one to three days ahead; Sunday editions, special sections, and inserts close earlier. Every paper publishes its exact cutoffs, so the numbers below are the pattern, not your paper’s calendar.
Buying craft, not a published rate: cutoff patterns are trade convention; the paper’s own deadline sheet controls, and asking for it is a one-line email.
| Product | Space closes | Materials close |
|---|---|---|
| Weekday ROP display | 3-5 days before run | 1-3 days before run |
| Sunday display | 5-7 days before | 3-5 days before |
| Special sections / TMC | 1-2 weeks before | About a week before |
| Preprint inserts | 1-2 weeks before | Printed pieces delivered to the plant days ahead |
| Classifieds / obituaries | Often next-day, sometimes same-day | With placement (text is the material) |
Source: Chicago Tribune self-serve ad portal (placeanad.chicagotribune.com), retrieved Jul 31, 2026. Classified/obituary same-day patterns visible in metro self-serve portals; display cutoffs published per paper.
Missing one, and what it costs
Miss the space deadline and you simply are not in the issue; no harm beyond the delay. Miss the materials deadline after reserving space and you are in genuine trouble: the paper held inventory for you, and many insertion agreements let the desk bill the space, run your previous ad (the “pickup”), or run a house ad at your expense. When a materials miss is coming, call before the deadline passes; desks reschedule advertisers who warn them and bill the ones who vanish.
Legal notice deadlines are different in kind
Commercial deadlines cost money; statutory ones cost validity. A notice that must run once a week for four successive weeks before a hearing has its first-run date fixed by arithmetic, and the paper’s own copy deadline sits days before that. The notice bureau does the deadline math per state, with the statute citations.
Craft
The calendar that never misses
Work backwards from the run date: run date, minus materials cutoff, minus your design time, minus approval time equals the day to start. For a weekly campaign, standing materials (one compliant file, updated monthly) turn every future deadline into a non-event, and make you the flexible advertiser standby pricing was invented for.