Community newspapers thrive by offering hyperlocal content

Posted by Lisette García on October 28, 2009 at 12:39 PM

The few newspapers flourishing despite the general current decline in circulation appear to have one thing in common: they give readers what they want, but can't get anywhere else. It is this philosophy that drives today's launch of Appleton Journal, a print weekly aimed at delivering local news typically snubbed by other media, according to WLUK-TV.

"We're basically a scrapbook for moms and dads and grandmas and grandpas, that's all we are," said Times-Villager Newspaper Group General Manager Bart Landsverk. The Appleton Journal is the media group's fourth paid weekly serving Wisconsin's Fox Valley, in the United States.

The same holds true for the Shaw Newspaper Group, the third-oldest continually-owned family media enterprise in the United States, according to the Public Broadcasting System. "Our franchise is local information," President and CEO Thomas Shaw was quoted as saying on Nightly Business Report. "Everything else in the electronic age is world news, national news, even regional news has become a commodity and people can get it just about anywhere. But people cannot get the information we provide our community anywhere but from us."

Part of the reason, according to McGhee, is that it "is still independently owned, it's still very much rooted in its community and services that community really well." However, pinpointing the right model for delivering content hasn't been perfected exactly. A wildly popular political publication, The Chi-Town Daily News, could not sustain itself, even as a non-profit organisation, because it operated online only, Editor & Publisher yesterday reported.

Instead, the government watchdog will re-emerge on November 9 as The Chicago Current, a for-profit monthly print edition, according to Chicago Public Radio. The publication's founder, former Chicago Tribune reporter Geoff Dougherty, hopes the reversion to print format will be the trick to its success, Crain's Chicago Business reported yesterday.