Editing Western Publishing (section)

===1970s===

In 1970, Western's sales reached $171.5 million but net profit fell to $3.9 million caused by the acquisition of a computerized typesetting facility and an eleven-week strike. As a result, the Hannibal plant was closed and the number of employees was reduced by 1,500 in mid-1974. Profits rose that year to $10.1 million; sales topped $215 million. In 1971, Western entered into an agreement with the [[Sesame Workshop|Children's Television Workshop]] to produce Golden Books featuring [[the Muppets]] of [[Sesame Street]]. In 1974, Dell Publishing Company signed a ten-year printing contract with Western worth more than $50 million. That same year construction began on a distribution and game-and-puzzle assembly center in [[Fayetteville, North Carolina]].<ref name="WPGHistory" />

Direct marketing accounted for twenty-five percent of Western's consumer product sales by 1976. This represented seventy percent of total sales. Driven by products such as the Betty Crocker Recipe Card Program, a monthly mailing of recipe cards to millions of customers, sales grew to $237.3 million in 1976 with net income of $10.8 million. In 1979, Western ceased to be an independent company when [[Mattel]] Inc. purchased the company<ref name="golden">{{Cite book |last=Marcus |first=Leonard S. |url=https://archive.org/details/goldenlegacyhowg0000marc |title=Golden Legacy |publisher=Golden Books |year=2007 |isbn=978-0-375-82996-3 |url-access=registration}}</ref>{{rp|202}} for $120.8 million in a cash/stock deal.<ref name="WPGHistory" />

By the late 1970s, Western was one of the largest commercial printers in the United States.{{Citation needed|date=March 2015}} It had four manufacturing plants and two distribution centers between Kansas and Maryland. It boasted of installing some of the first heatset web [[offset printing]] presses in the US.{{Citation needed|date=March 2015}} As well, Western had the largest offset, sheet-fed presses, some exceeding 78 inches wide, printing in five colors, and one of the largest [[bindery]] operations in the United States.{{Citation needed|date=March 2015}} Among other things, it printed [[mass-market paperback]] books under contract, and was the primary manufacturer and distributor of the board game [[Trivial Pursuit]], as well as other tabletop games.{{Citation needed|date=March 2015}} It developed and printed specialty cookbooks, premiums, and material for many [[Fortune 500]] clients. At one time, Western printed almost everything from "business cards to billboards", and employed over 2500 full-time employees.{{Citation needed|date=March 2015}}