Spokane Valley-based Northwest Offset Printing Inc. has announced it will close in September.

As a result, Hagadone Media Group will take over printing of The Spokesman-Review.

Northwest Offset Printing and The Spokesman-Review are both subsidiaries of Cowles Co., and Hagadone Media Group is owned by Hagadone Corp. The Journal of Business is owned by Northwest Business Press Inc., which also is a subsidiary of Cowles Co.

Cowles Co. and Hagadone Corp. have long been competitors in the Inland Northwest newspaper industry. Leaders of both companies, however, say in a joint press release that the collaboration on printing makes logistical and financial sense.

“We are intensely focused on making sure we can preserve our robust content offerings and deadlines to meet our readers’ and advertisers’ consumption needs, and (Hagadone Media Group) has the location, expertise, and experience to do a great job for us,” says William “Stacey” Cowles, president of Cowles Co. and Northwest Offset Printing, in the release.

The companies will work together in the coming months to install inserting equipment from Northwest Offset Printing, which will double Hagadone Media Group’s capacity.

Cowles, who is also publisher of The Spokesman-Review, told employees of Northwest Offset Printing that headwinds in the printing industry were too strong to overcome, a separate release states.

The 68 employees at Northwest Offset Printing will receive severance and many will receive retention bonuses to stay through the last day of operation.

Northwest Offset Printing serves 43 customers, including regional daily and weekly newspapers, direct mailers, and real estate, advertising, tourism, and lifestyle magazines.

Hagadone Media Group currently prints daily and weekly newspapers, including the Coeur d’Alene Press, the Bonner County Daily Bee, the Columbia Basin Herald, and the Bonners Ferry Herald.

In April, Cowles Co. announced it entered into an agreement to donate the assets of the 132-year-old newspaper to Spokane-based Comma Community Journalism Lab, a nonprofit that partners with local school districts, regional universities, and other nonprofit-based news organizations.