Writing a Proper Death Notice for the Sjr Newspaper
Most people don't realize how much leeway newspapers actually give you with obituary content. When I was putting together my father's death notice for the Sjr back in 2019, I expected to be locked into some rigid template. Turns out they had very few hard rules, and the flexibility they offered made the whole process noticeably easier during a rough week. Sjr Newspaper Obits Honoring Legacies Connecting Communities Through Death Notices works on a fairly standard model. You submit the text, they check it against their style guide, and it runs in the next available print and online edition. The fee structure is usually based on word count and whether you want it in both print and digital. It costs more than a classified ad, but significantly less than running a full editorial feature.
What You Need to Include
The basics are what you would expect. Full name, age at death, city or town of residence, date of death, and a brief biographical sketch. Then you list survivors — spouse, children, grandchildren, siblings. After that comes any service details: funeral home name, visitation times, cemetery location. If the person served in the military, include branch and years of service. That last bit matters because the obit editor at Sjr will often add a small military notation box next to the notice automatically. One thing I learned the hard way: do not skip the funeral home contact line. People outside your immediate family rely on that information to know where to go. I left it out on my first draft and had to call back and pay an additional amendment fee just to add it before the evening deadline. It was maybe twenty dollars, but it was annoying to sort out while already dealing with everything else.
The Submission Process
Sjr accepts submissions through their website obituary portal, by email, or by phone if you are working through a funeral home directly. The online portal is the fastest route. You fill out a form, upload the finalized text, and receive a confirmation email within ten to fifteen minutes during business hours. If you submit after 3 PM local time, it rolls to the next business day's edition. That cutoff is strict. I learned that one when my sister tried to push something through at 4:45 PM on a Friday and we missed the Saturday paper entirely. The confirmation email will include a proof number. Save that. If anything looks wrong after the paper publishes, you call the obit desk and reference that proof number. They will run a correction on the following page, usually free of charge if the error is on their end.
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Writing Style and Common Pitfalls
Keep the tone restrained. I saw a lot of drafts come through that were overly flowery or included religious language that went on for two pages. The editors will trim it down to fit standard length, which sometimes removes the exact phrasing the family wanted. It is easier to write a tighter notice from the start and risk losing nothing in the edit. Another issue people run into is listing too many survivors. Some families include aunts, uncles, cousins, in-laws, and even step-relations back to great-great. The editors do not cut the list, but it pushes the word count up and the price goes with it. A good rule of thumb is immediate family plus grandparents and great-grandparents. That covers the people who would realistically want to know and keeps the cost manageable. Photo submissions are optional but recommended. Sjr accepts JPEG or PNG files up to about five megabytes. The image needs to be a clear headshot or a respectful portrait. Blurry phone photos taken at a dark funeral home get rejected or replaced with a stock placeholder, which looks worse for everyone involved. Use a decent camera photo or a scan of an existing printed picture.
Timing and Visibility
If someone recently passed and you want maximum visibility, aim to submit by Tuesday afternoon for a Wednesday or Thursday publication. That catches the widest readership window before the weekend when circulation drops. For someone who died earlier in the week and you need to get it out fast, Monday submission hits the Tuesday paper, which is still a strong day for local readers. One edge case that caught me off guard: if the person was a long-term Sjr subscriber or had a notable community role, the obit editor might flag the notice for an expanded online feature. This is not guaranteed and sometimes happens without warning. I found out my brother's notice got pulled into a "Local Lives" sidebar section because he had volunteered at the library for thirty years. It was a nice touch, but we did not know it would happen until the proof came back marked differently.
Pricing and Payment
Prices vary based on length and format. A standard short notice runs roughly one hundred fifty to two hundred fifty dollars. A longer biographical piece with a photo can climb into the three hundred fifty to five hundred range. Payment is handled online at the time of submission or by phone if you are placing it through the obit desk. They accept major credit cards and sometimes offer payment plans for larger institutional accounts, though that is rare for individual families. There is no refund policy once the notice has been published. If you need a correction after that point, you pay for the correction run. So double-check everything before you hit submit. Names, dates, spellings. I had to catch a misspelled middle name on my own proof only because I read it aloud three times before sending.
When to Look Elsewhere
The Sjr works well for local, community-focused notices where you want neighbors and acquaintances to see the information. It is not the right choice if you need something international in scope or if the deceased had a profile that extends well beyond the local area. In those cases, a national obituary service or a platform like Legacy.com might reach the right audience more efficiently. Sjr is solid for what it does, but it is a local paper and its reach ends where the distribution map ends.
