Writing an Obituary for the Richmond Register
Getting an obituary into the Richmond Register is straightforward if you know what you are doing, but there are enough small traps that people waste time and money doing it wrong. The paper runs local obits daily, and they charge by the line or by the inch depending on whether you want a standard text layout or something with a photo. Understanding how their process actually works will save you from making mistakes that delay publication or cost extra. I have submitted obituaries for the Richmond Register at least a dozen times over the years, mostly for family members and neighbors. The first time I did it, I thought the process would be simple, so I just emailed a draft to the general news desk. That was a mistake. They do accept email submissions, but if you are not routing it through the proper obituary department, it sits in a queue and gets lost. I learned the hard way that the obituary editor's direct line is the number listed under "Classifieds" on their website, not the main newsroom switchboard. Call that number and ask for the obituary desk. Tell them you have a submission ready. They will either walk you through it or tell you where to upload it. Here is how I usually handle it now. I draft the obituary myself on my computer, then I print it out and take it in person to the Richmond Register office on East Main Street. Walking in works because the staff there knows most of the local families, and they can flag issues before publication—like a misspelled funeral home name or an incorrect service time. If you are calling from out of town, which happens often when relatives live elsewhere, send the text to the obituary desk email address they give you over the phone, and follow up with a fax or a scan if they want a signed copy. Some offices require a signed death certificate on file before they will run the piece, though this is not always consistent.
The fee structure changed a couple of years ago. The base rate covers roughly 50 lines of text plus one small black-and-white photo if you include it. Each additional line after that runs about two dollars. A photo, even a modest size, adds fifteen to twenty dollars on top. I know because I compared the bill carefully. Some people assume paying more gets you better placement or a bigger photo for free. That is not how it works. You pay for length and images, and the paper decides the layout. Writing the content itself is the part people struggle with, even though the format is pretty rigid. The Richmond Register prefers the traditional structure: full name, age, city of residence, date and place of death, surviving family members, predeceased relatives, service details, and a donation suggestion if applicable. They do not run memorial advertisements that read like eulogies. If you write something that sounds more like a tribute than a factual notice, they will cut it back or return it for revision. I once submitted a draft that included three paragraphs about the deceased's volunteer work and a quote from a local minister. The editor called me and said the piece was too long and too personal for their standard obituary format. She suggested I write a separate community page feature instead, which she was willing to run for a higher fee. That ended up being the better outcome because the obituary ran the same day while the community piece came out later in the week. Photos are worth including, but do not treat them as optional decoration. A small headshot in the obituary section gets noticed more than a generic landscape or group photo. The paper scans images directly from files, so you can email a JPEG at 300 DPI and they will use it as is. Do not send a scanned print photo from a frame unless you have no digital original. The quality drop is noticeable, and the typesetter may reject it outright. I learned this when I mailed a 4x6 print in a padded envelope to the office, and the editor told me the scanner could not pick up the detail well enough to reproduce it cleanly. She asked me to bring in the digital file the next morning. I had one sitting in my email drafts from when I originally took the picture two years earlier.
Timing matters more than most people realize. The Richmond Register runs obituaries by 3 PM the day before publication, which means if someone dies on a Wednesday afternoon and the family wants the notice in Thursday's paper, you need the final approved text and payment in hand by Wednesday morning at the latest. Weekends are slower, and the office closes early on Saturdays. If a death occurs on a Friday evening and you miss the cutoff, the notice does not appear until Monday. I have seen grieving families miss that window by a few hours and end up waiting three extra days to see the notice run. Set a reminder. Have the text drafted before the funeral home confirms the service details, because you can always swap in the exact time and location later, but the basic biographical information is usually ready quickly. There is one edge case that trips people up regularly. When the deceased has lived in multiple counties or has family spread across state lines, the paper may ask you to specify which Richmond area connection qualifies for the standard local rate. If the person moved away years ago but kept a second home in the county, the editor might classify it as a regional notice rather than a standard local obituary, which changes the pricing. The workaround is simple: tell the editor upfront about all the relevant residences and affiliations, and let them sort out the classification. I had a case where my father's second address was technically in a neighboring county, but he had been a member of a Richmond church for forty years. The editor ran it as a local obit without extra charge once I explained the situation directly. Proofreading your own draft before submitting is non-negotiable. I check the names of every surviving family member against the death certificate listing, which the funeral director provides. Spelling errors in living relatives' names cause calls from confused readers, and the paper will run a correction in a future issue if something gets messed up. Corrections cost extra and look awkward. One time I accidentally listed a brother as still living when he had predeceased the subject. The editor caught it during the normal review and flagged it, which saved me from a public error. Not every office has that level of careful review, so do the work yourself first.
Get the Full Details
Payment options are limited. The Richmond Register accepts credit cards, checks, and money orders. Cash is sometimes accepted at the front desk, but do not rely on it if you are mailing payment from another state. Include a copy of the final text with your payment so the office can match the bill to the correct submission. I recommend keeping a photocopy of everything—the submitted text, the receipt, and the proof of payment—in a single folder. If the obituary does not appear in the expected edition, having that documentation makes it much easier to resolve the issue quickly. The obituary section at the Richmond Register serves a practical purpose beyond just informing people about a death. It is where the community tracks who has passed, who is surviving, and what the service arrangements are. Readers use it to confirm attendance at visitations and to understand family connections across generations. Getting the details right matters because the notice becomes a permanent record. Mistakes get repeated online if websites scrape the paper's content, and those corrected versions are harder to track down. I usually leave about forty-five minutes at the office when I drop off the obituary in person. That gives time for the editor to ask questions, suggest revisions, and confirm the exact run date. Walking away without that conversation is risky because you may not know your text has an issue until the paper hits the stands. The whole process takes longer than it should for people who rush through it, but taking the time upfront prevents most of the common problems that show up later.
