A small newspaper group is about to launch eight free weeklies in towns across Kent. KOS Media, the Ashford-based publisher of Kent on Sunday, plans to launch a series of titles in early September, including Your Dover Paper, with each of the others - covering Canterbury, Folkestone, Ashford, Maidstone, Medway, Thanet and Swale - using the same title formula.
Print runs for the 72-page full-colour tabloids will vary from title to title, but amount in total to 100,000. The aim is to match the circulation or distribution figure of existing titles in each area. Therefore their main rivals will be the Kent Messenger series and Northcliffe. The new papers will be available newsagents, supermarkets and petrol stations, and 90 distributors (aka road runners) will also hand out copies to directly to people in the street.
But print will run hand-in-hand with eight corresponding websites, offering up-to-the-minute news ("we won't hold on to stories when they break", says KOS editorial director Ian Patel) and video. "We are expecting large video content," says Patel. He wants readers to send in material as well, and there are plans to make video packages for advertisers too.
The company is planning to recruit 15 to 20 journalists, who will be trained in video techniques in order to provide a continual stream of video content as well as producing written reports for web and print.
There is a clear emphasis on attracting young readers. As Patel told HoldtheFrontPage: "We hope the papers will appeal to as many people as possible, but the use of this new technology will open us up to younger readers."
Patel also stresses another plus: as with Kent on Sunday , all the new titles will be available in e-editions which KOS has successfully pioneered to win increasing audiences.
So, as I said to Patel, these launches suggest a faith in newsprint combined with an acknowledgment that more and more people a reading online. It does more of course. It is a further example of hyper-locality, the belief that offering people local content - along with a method to boost greater interaction (through video especially) - is the way ahead. We'll have to keep a close watch on this initiative. After all, Kent on Sunday is now boasting a verified distribution of 122,417 copies, no mean feat.
