A former editor has explained why businesses have struggled to get news coverage due to the massive upheaval in regional journalism.
Richard Bowyer, who was Editor-in-Chief of Staffordshire Sentinel Newspapers, said the decline in print journalism and other traditional methods of reporting had had a knock-on effect on the type, and quantity, of local stories published.
This has particularly affected business articles, which are not seen as commercial as many other stories in the fast-moving modern digital media world, he said.
He was speaking at the Press and PR launch of Daily Focus – the business news service for Staffordshire, published by Staffordshire Chambers of Commerce in partnership with creative agency i-creation.
Richard, now a Senior Lecturer in Journalism at the University of Derby, told an audience at the Quarter@Potbank restaurant at the Spode site in Stoke how he had witnessed the changes first hand during his 30-year career.
He said: “Print journalism was one of the great industries stuck in the past that has been forced to change. I guess it is very much like what happened to pottery, mining, steel and ship building industries.
“Although we blame the internet for the decline to the print industry, it didn’t happen quickly – it was death by a thousand cuts.
“The slow death started before the internet in the 1970s and 80s. On only one occasion in 30 years did I see regional newspaper sales increase.
“But the cash kept flowing in because there was nowhere else for it to go.
“But in 2007 the cuts became an open wound – the disruption was the internet. Classified advertising moved online virtually overnight, and money poured out of the newspaper industry quicker than I could say ‘hold the front page’.
“And with the money disappearing, consultants came in to streamline the business – it became slash and burn.”
He added: “What does the dramatic change mean to the provision of local news, in particular, the provision of local business news?
“With fewer staff it is impossible to produce the same numbers of local stories and, particularly, business stories will suffer.
“If a newspaper isn’t writing about your news who, or what, is going to tell the world about the stories involving your companies?
“There is a gap in the market for great business news and it clear the local media has withdrawn from that space.
“It is fitting the Chamber, which champions businesses across our county, should step into this gap to provide the service.
“The rolling out of Daily Focus is the modern world of journalism – innovative organisations working together to provide a vital business news service to ensure Staffordshire companies have a voice and can tell the world about themselves.
“I am saddened by the demise of the regional printed press but the Chamber with i-creation has the chance to create something bold and new.”
