NYT redesigns its two Florida papers: Ocala, Gainesville
Two Florida-based New York Times-company papers have redesigned in the past week: The Ocala Star-Banner and the Gainesville Sun.
The papers announced two months ago they were merging their newsrooms, which are now all based in Gainesville. The Star Banner circulates about 46,000 daily and 50,000 Sunday. The Sun circulates 46,100 daily and 49,800 Sunday.
Ocala’s redesign launched last Monday, Oct. 20. Managing Editor Tom McNiff writes the redesign was the first for the Star-Banner in more than a dozen years.
On the left is the most recent daily front we could find — it’s nearly two years old. On the right is today’s front:
Here’s a closer look at page one:
Here’s a video in which McNiff describes the changes:
Here’s the new Gainesville Sun:
Again, the page on the left is the most recent front we could find with a Google image search. On the right is today’s front. A closer look:
We’re not quite sure when the Gainesville changes kicked in — perhaps that same day, last Monday. We can find nothing about the redesign on the Sun’s web site.
We’re trying for more pages of each. Stay tuned.
October 26th, 2008 at 1:05 pm
As I was looking at the Gainesville Sun, I thought the flag was ugly. Then I scanned down and saw something even uglier - “Florida 63, Kentucky 5, Florida declaws Cats.” I guess my boys will go home, lick their wounds and try to figure out who will replace Lyons, Pryor and a couple of others who are out for the season.
October 26th, 2008 at 4:12 pm
Beauty, Elizabeth, is in the eye of the beholder, and I found the Gator victory yesterday to be far from ugly.
– John Telford
U of F ‘93
October 26th, 2008 at 4:18 pm
Oh, one more thing, an interesting bit of trivia. If memory serves, the Sun’s last redesign, which was introduced just after I left the paper in “93 or “94, yielded a World’s Best Design from SND the following year.
I wonder if they’ll manage to get another with this new design?
October 26th, 2008 at 4:23 pm
Ok…I lied…one more thing.
After I read my last comment, I wanted to clarify that I had NOTHING to do with the award-winning redesign of the Sun. I’m sure if I did have something to do with it, it wouldn’t have won a World’s Best.
October 28th, 2008 at 9:08 am
I hate the new flag — the old one was one of the coolest in the country. Stylish and versatile. This one is just clunky and ugly.
October 28th, 2008 at 1:19 pm
The new Ocala nameplate is an improvement, but why did they tinker with Gainesville’s? That’s no improvement at all.
From my experience with NYTRNG, at least in Sarasota, there was much emphasis placed on “branding.” It’s funny that Gainesville threw out their “brand,” because the outgoing Gainesville nameplate was the one thing about that paper that stood out to me!
Note that the name of the city is back in Ocala’s nameplate. Seems a lot of papers dropped their city names to try to appeal to a larger audience, so I’m surprised “Ocala” is back atop 1A. (From my Sarasota experience: Every 1A was zoned six ways, like the B section, so every nameplate had a different city atop “Herald-Tribune.”)
Probably because of consolidation, I see Bureau Grotesque seeped in at Ocala. I think every NYTRNG paper uses it now. (We had it in Sarasota when I was there in 2005-06.)
Without going into a critique, headline faces in the specimens posted here are kerned too tight, almost to be unreadable at a glance at 10 feet (think: rack sales).
March 10th, 2009 at 1:55 pm
I hate everything about the new designed paper. I hate that they dropped the t.v. guide. Only Jacksonville currently has a magazine t.v. guide and I am switching to their paper. I hate the antique column being moved to Saturday. The Living section now is just a front page and the funnies. Basically the new paper is horrible. I have never read my paper online and never will. I guess I will have to subscribe to the Miami Herald.