Russell Tuff
Russell began his newspaper career in 1965, sweeping floors and cleaning toilets in the offices of his parents' weekly paper in Blackduck , Minn. He was later promoted to hot lead melter on the Linotype machine and eventually ran several presses including a Heidelberg, AB Dick Offset and a Goss press. Seeing his potential, his parents added sales calls to his duties at the age of 16.
After college, he began a career in Radio Sales, took on duties at Zales Jewelry as assistant store manger, and moved on to become a Financial Planner with IDS American Express.
Russell joined Tuff Publications, where he served as sales manager in Blue Earth, Minn. In 1989, Tuff Publications moved to Collier County, where Russell served as publisher of the Everglades Echo, the Golden Gate Gazette and several other Florida publications.
He launched his first website in 1997 and spoke to the Florida Press Association about the importance of a community newspaper to be on the web.
Russell launched several newspapers and accompanying websites from community weeklies, to Spanish language publications for Naples News Media Group (an EW Scripps company) during his tenure. He served in the roles of Publisher and Executive Editor Community Publications at Scripps. His duties included advancing a chain of community newspapers to collaborative journalism to heighten the quality of journalsm within the communities they serve.
In 2009, Russell lead his newspaper teams to several first place finishes in the Florida Press Association Newspaper Contest, including the coveted First Place in General Excellence.
Russell has been president or director for many organization including church councils, chamber of commmerces, economic development advisory boards, planning commissioner to local civic and non-profit boards.
His latest venture is Social-Impact, a Public Relations firm specializing in Internet Marketing. The emphasis is marketing through content, and building the web platforms to provide the integration needed for optimal performance and searchability on the search engines. You can find it by going to http://social-impact.com.