Publishing an Obituary in the Cedar Rapids Gazette: What Actually Happens
I dealt with this last winter for my aunt who passed in Iowa City. Nobody tells you how much the process costs upfront or how long it takes before it actually prints. The Gazette runs obituaries every day, but there are some mechanical things that trip people up if they try to file it themselves. The paper publishes deaths through a paid placement system. You write the text, submit it, and pay by length. The standard rate runs about $15 to $20 per inch, though that moves depending on where in the paper it lands. A typical obituary runs 4 to 8 inches. That puts most families at roughly $80 to $160, sometimes more if you add a photo or go longer than standard. The submission window matters more than people realize. If you send it in after the afternoon cutoff — usually around 2 or 3 p.m. Central — it doesn't run the next day. It bumps to a later edition, and sometimes gets pushed three or four days out. I learned that the hard way because my aunt's obituary missed the Tuesday print because someone on our end typed the time wrong. We ended up paying for two editions just to make sure it ran when we wanted.
You can submit through the Gazette website directly, or call their ad department. The online form is easier to fill out but it has fewer formatting options. If your family wants something specific — a special layout, a religious symbol, an unusual font for the heading — calling is faster. They transfer you to someone who actually handles the placement desk. Here is the part nobody warns you about: the death certificate verification. The Gazette requires confirmation that the person has actually died before they publish. This usually comes from the funeral home handling arrangements, and they send it directly to the paper. If you are doing this outside a funeral home, you need to have the death certificate number ready, or they will hold your obituary until they get confirmation from the county. That can add one to two days. Rural counties sometimes take longer to process death certificates than urban ones, so plan accordingly if the passing happened in a smaller community outside Cedar Rapids. Writing the actual text is simpler than most people think, and that is not a good thing because simplicity makes mistakes easier. Include the full legal name, age, city of residence, date of death, and a brief biography. Surviving family members go at the end. If there is a service or memorial planned, list the details. Don't forget whether the family prefers donations to a charity instead of flowers — that line usually goes at the very bottom and people rush past it.
Photos cost extra. A small grayscale image in the obituary section adds another charge, typically between $30 and $75 depending on size. Color photos are not usually offered in the standard obituary section unless you are paying for a display ad above the line. Keep that in mind before you upload a high-resolution file, because you might not need the expense. If you want to check whether a recent obituary is running or see the current rates, you can visit the Gazette website directly and look up their obituary submission page. They list the contact number and the form right there. No download link is really needed — everything is done online now. The website is the official place to submit, and it tracks your submission from filing to publication. A couple of things I wish someone had told me before I started:
Get the Full Details
The proof you receive before printing is your last chance to fix errors. Read it carefully. One wrong date or misspelled name shows up in print permanently, and corrections run at the same per-inch rate, which means you pay twice for the same mistake. I saw a family pay extra to correct a grandmother's maiden name that was spelled wrong on the first draft. It was a four-letter difference and it cost them about $40 in correction fees. Also, spacing matters for pricing. The Gazette calculates charges by the inch, not by the word count. If you write a very long obituary with narrow margins or small text, it might still only run three inches. But if you use generous spacing and larger type, that same content stretches to five inches and costs more. Decide early what you want the final look to be and estimate the length before you submit, because the typesetter will arrange it and the inch measurement is set at that point. There is not much wiggle room after approval. The whole process from writing to publication usually takes two to four business days if you submit before the afternoon cutoff and the funeral home sends the death certificate promptly. Emergency or same-day placement is sometimes available, but it costs significantly more and is not guaranteed depending on how full the paper is that day.
If you run into trouble with the online form or the obituary is getting held up for no reason, call the ad desk directly. They deal with this every single day and they know which bottles are backed up. Standing on the website trying to resolve a verification delay rarely works faster than picking up the phone.
