Nicole Bogdas

A week ago The Huntsville Times in Alabama unveiled a new promo only design for its Sunday front page. I talked (via e-mail) with Design Editor Doug Mendenhall about the change. Below is a before and two afters followed by his responses to my questions.

What was the impetus for the change?
As part of the Newspaper Next project, The Huntsville Times has been trying to identify innovative ways to reshape the product to stay viable in this head-spinning world of new technologies and soft print sales. Our metro editor and circulation manager participated in an API seminar on single-copy, and formed an in-house committee to look at trying out what they’d learned on the Sunday paper, our biggest opportunity for increasing single-copy sales. We talked about Alan Jacobson’s ideas — bigger headlines, simpler images — and how that might translate into our market.
How does this affect your planning process?
Keep in mind that this project is in its infancy, with just one issue under our belts as I write this. We monitor our Sunday possibilities throughout the week, trying to identify possible A1 candidates. We’ve shuffled newshole some, making certain that our Local section has enough space to accommodate some stories that previously would have run on the front page. We were not content with that inaugural issue, and are implementing a midweek “maestro” type session once the primo A1 promo has been identified.
What sort of criteria does a story have to meet to get a promo?
It has to be interesting. It has to have appeal to a younger audience than our typically aging subscriber base. It should have appeal to a female audience, since research says they constitute a majority of possible buyers.
Is there a set number or limit on items?
No, but in prototypes and this week’’s issue we’ve been confortable with 10 or 11, including three or four above-the-flag skyboxes that are fairly typical for U.S. dailies. We may see this number decline as we try to pick a single item to turn into a centerpiece promo — instead of this week’’s cafeteria look where all the promos were given fairly equal display.
What happens if news breaks?
This question is a concern in-house, and my argument has been that the bigger a breaking story is, the more likely that we would have resorted to a promotional A1 package for it anyway. Take 9-11, for instance — our A1 that day consisted of a full-page photo with a huge headline and refers to our inside coverage. There’s no reason to think this style of presentation is inappropriate for breaking news. In fact, this week’’s page contains a double homicide that broke late, and the only discussion among editors was whether it should have been moved into a more prominent slot higher on the page.
Who worked on the redesign?
Me, myself and I.
Was there a reason you chose all sans-serif type?
Our standard headline face is Miller Roman, but on each page we allow a single Bureau Grotesque head for either the centerpiece or the lead story on the page. For this project I went to the heaviest weight of Bureau Grotesque in our palette, something passersby can see without even slowing down. I may rethink that if we change to a centerpiece promo, at least for that headline.
What is the designer’s schedule for something like this?
By Thursday I can begin putting together skyboxes, since most of them are early-run feature items. I spent most of Friday writing and designing the rest of the page, leaving three blank holes with definite instructions for our weekend page designer. One was for a big outdoor festival, one for the NFL draft, although I’’d already selected a photo for that, and the third was supposed to be for the best breaking wire story but became instead our double homicide, which the city desk wrote into a murder mystery. I was proud of them for getting into the spirit of the page.
What’s the reaction been?
The editor is skittish, having fielded about a dozen calls and e-mails complaining about the change. An early letter to the editor compared the approach to The Weekly Reader. The circulation department is still getting its numbers together, but reports no complaints or cancellations. The publisher’’s attitude continues to be consistent with the Newspaper Next project: We’ll try this, and if it doesn’t work we’ll try something else.