Readers,
Ten months ago, I took a sabbatical from The Durango Herald to do a journalism fellowship at the University of Michigan.
During my time as a Knight-Wallace fellow in Ann Arbor, Michigan, I focused my research on how small-market community newspapers can stay afloat as technology and social media change the way people get their news and the way businesses advertise their goods and services.
I’m not the first person to research this, and I won’t be the last. That’s largely for two reasons: Small-market newspapers account for most of the newspapers in the U.S., and technological advancement will continue its sometimes dizzying acceleration and create an increasing need for the news industry to adapt just as rapidly.
What has happened to the news industry in the last decade is easy to identify. Print advertising eroded, Google and Facebook drastically changed news-consumption patterns and newspaper business models became outdated.
My research varied, from learning how to lead during a time of innovation, to analyzing new business models, to studying the psychological and social implications of social media. Much of that research was done at the various schools at the University of Michigan. I also worked with a new venture at the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill. UNC recently established the Center for Innovation and Sustainability in Local Media, and its mission is to track the changes in the news industry and the drastic effects they have had on communities throughout the country. Finding ways to save community journalism is the center’s main focus. Nearly 7,100 newspapers regularly publish in the United States, and 6,851 of them have daily circulations less than 50,000, according to Editor & Publisher’s database. So it’s critical that community newspapers survive.
The trend for small-market newspapers in the last decade is that they are being purchased by large companies – some of them hedge fund or private equity firms that are focused on profit, not journalism – and so ownership of community newspapers is concentrated to a handful of owners. When the newspapers don’t make money or cannot quickly adapt to reaching their audiences on a digital platform, the owners close up shop and leave a community without a source of local news. The result is a growing number of news deserts in the country. When I applied for the Knight-Wallace fellowship, my goal was to learn how to keep The Durango Herald and our sister newspapers evolving. We are fortunate to be owned by a family dedicated to journalism and serving its community.
The Herald recently reduced its print frequency. A combination of factors drove what was a difficult, but right, decision. Such changes are happening often in small communities across the U.S. It happened eight years ago in Ann Arbor. I interviewed residents, government leaders and business owners while I was there. What I learned will be invaluable as I help lead the Herald forward after these changes.
Chief among my priorities is to lead a concerted effort to engage the community and our readers. We want to be relevant in your lives, and to do that we must engage with you beyond our stories and photos. The Herald recently was selected by the Poynter Institute to participate in a yearlong Local News Innovation Program. Funded by the Knight Foundation and the Lenfest Institute for Journalism, the program will help guide us through an internal transition to meet our readers’ needs. In coming months, readers and business owners can expect the opportunity to attend events hosted by our newsroom in an effort to create a two-way conversation about our coverage and about issues in our community.
We continue to review the manner in which we deliver content to you in our print edition. The Herald is a local newspaper, and our mission is to bring you local news you can’t get daily anywhere else. With our recent changes, we have not reduced the amount of coverage and stories we write. The difference is, not every story ends up in a print edition because of space constraints. All of our content is published online, however. We will continue to focus on local news.
Since the change to the print frequency, we added puzzles to our Weekend Edition. We’re open to hearing from you about changing puzzle offerings in the future.
We also are having conversations about the scoreboard in our Sports section. We mostly eliminated the scoreboard in print in favor of creating more local stories about athletes. We recognize that some readers value the scoreboard and wish to see it return. Sports Editor John Livingston and I are considering options for creating a modified scoreboard that has the most useful and relevant content for local readers.
The takeaway from 10 months of research and working with industry organizations dedicated to saving the news industry is this: Local news is more important than ever, and there are myriad reasons to be encouraged about our future.
News reading is not going away. It has grown. The Herald reaches more readers now than it ever has in its history. Combine our print readers and online readers, and our reach is hundreds of thousands each week. Reader habits have changed, and that requires us to meet our audiences where they are. We will continue to do that.
I always welcome feedback from our readers and community members. Reach me at amaestas@durangoherald.com or 375-4539. Let’s chat on the phone, exchange emails or meet for coffee.
Thanks for reading.
Amy Maestas
Senior editor
