Wilson, N.C. launches redesign
The Times of Wilson, N.C. launched a dramatic redesign this morning.
A before-and-after look at the new page one:
Here’s a closer look at the new front. Note the coupon at the bottom right:
In an essay entitled “Irritating readers for fun and profit,” design consultant Alan Jacobson writes:
On April 27 and 28, newspaper readers in Wilson, N.C. were shown a prototype of a redesigned Wilson Times.
They hated it. HATED IT!
But the redesign launched today in spite of their objections. Why?
Because the leaders of The Wilson Times had the courage to do what needed to be done - even if they had to defy readers to reach their goal. According to Gayle Smith, Wilson’s sales and marketing director, this redesign should boost ROP revenue by at least ten percent.
It’s all about the advertising.
Forget the readers, service the advertising. Interesting concept. But what happens to ad rates if readers give up on the product? Alan seems to take that into account. Read it here.
Here’s a closer look at that sports front:
Alan also previewed a few features pages for us the other day. Here’s the new features front:
Alan sent us comments from the Times‘ features editor, Lisa Batts:
Robin and I gave away 50 newspapers at the Wilson Mall McDonald’s this morning. Everyone seemed to really like the new look. We talked to people after they had read the paper, and we didn’t get a single complaint about the redesign. Many people mentioned how much they liked the pizzaman story, and a number of people said they really loved the front page coupon. But they all said they liked the look.
We wondered if they were being nice to us because they didn’t want to say anything mean to our face. But they were so excited about the pizza coupon; it was funny! One woman who works at Hunt HS said she loved the prom photos.
Several said they wanted to make the pizza guy a hero and wished we could have more stories like that.
We should talk to the public like that more often.
The Times is 16,000-circulation daily located about 35 miles east of Raleigh.
May 5th, 2009 at 1:09 pm
It could be one of those things where current subscribers hate it but non-subscribers — who aren’t already bought in — love it.
May 6th, 2009 at 8:32 pm
That’s quite the ad stack on the sports front. Wow.
May 19th, 2009 at 10:07 pm
Yeah, that’s a great way to do business. Alienate your core customers.
/sarcasm
May 21st, 2009 at 12:34 am
I liked the old sports front better, especially the flag. The new one seems to be a whole lot of empty blue, and there’s a whole lot of gray type. And the new headline fonts really get under my skin. It seems like the pendulum is swinging back toward sans serif headline fonts at many newspapers. Everybody party like it’s 1978! (When newspapers were still the big boys on the block.)