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Ron Mix, founding publisher of the Berkeley Daily Planet, has resigned his position with Bigfoot Media Inc. to accept the position of Vice President/Chief Operating Officer with Pizazz Printing in Milpitas, the company that prints the Planet. 

“It has indeed been a pleasure being part of such a special project as birthing a community newspaper for a city such as Berkeley,” Mix said. “Despite a few bumps in the road up the hill, the newspaper is an unqualified success and has gained broad acceptance as the community’s daily newspaper. I believe we have shown Berkeley that it needed its own community newspaper, and the community has responded favorably with its support.” 

Mix was part of the team that launched the Berkeley Daily Planet on April 7, 1999. Assuming the title of publisher as of today is Bigfoot Chief Executive Officer Arnold Lee. Day-to-day sales operations will be directed by Lori O’Neill, the Planet’s new general manager. Formerly with McGraw Hill Publications, O’Neill is a Berkeley-area resident and is the former general manager of The Daily Californian, the student newspaper at UC Berkeley. 

News operations will continue to be directed by Rob Cunningham, who has served as editor since the newspaper’s launch last year. 

Mix cited personal reasons for leaving the Daily Planet. 

“For the past 15 months I have labored up to 16 hours a day producing what I believe is a fabulous community newspaper,” Mix said. “That has meant being away from my family for weeks at a time. My new position will allow me to be home every night. That means too much to me.” 

Mix and his family reside in the Central Valley community of Turlock, where his two daughters attend Turlock High School. His wife is employed by Valley Mountain Regional Center in Modesto. 

Prior to joining Bigfoot Media 16 months ago, Mix served as publisher of the Turlock Journal and general manager of the Merced Sun-Star with US Media Group. Before moving to California four years ago, Mix was editor and publisher of weekly and daily newspapers in Missouri and Illinois and owned community newspapers in Missouri. 

“Berkeley is about as far away and as different from Missouri as you can get,” Mix said. “But no matter what the locale, people need and want a good community source for news.” 

While Mix leaves Bigfoot Media Inc., he remains a stockholder in the company. 

“I wish to thank Ron for all of his hard work and effort in helping to found and grow the Berkeley Daily Planet,” said Bigfoot CEO Arnold Lee. “Of course, while it is never easy to see such a valuable colleague move on, we wish him all the best with his new career. At the same time, we are extremely excited and pleased to have Lori O’Neill on board as General Manager as she is already helping us continue to grow very rapidly as we have already successfully done in the past 12 months. 

“It also goes without saying that we continue (as always) to be committed to the highest quality of news reporting provided by the Berkeley Daily Planet.”