Britain’s
first gay newspaper, the Pink Paper , is to relaunch next week, and
goes back on newsprint for the first time in five years.
The
paper closed in October, after racking up claimed losses of £400,000 a
year, and was taken over two weeks later by new owners Millivres
Prowlers Group, which publishes the Gay Times .
It said the overwhelming response from a recent reader survey was “give us back our newspaper”.
It
has decided to take the Pink Paper from an A4 magazine to tabloid-size
newspaper. It was fortnightly, but there are plans to increase the
frequency to weekly by the end of the summer.
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Head of business Rob Dean said the plan is to concentrate on serious journalism and community reporting.
“People
were disappointed when the previous owners turned the Pink Paper into a
news magazine four years ago, but the need for a proper lesbian and gay
newspaper has never gone away.
“Despite there being over a dozen
free gay titles available in the UK, almost all are in a similar format
and increasingly focus their editorial on ‘the scene’ – gay pubbing and
clubbing, a major source of revenue for the free gay press.”
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Tris Reid-Smith, who has been editor of the title for three years, said: “We want to increase our national coverage.
Because of budgetary restrictions we ended up becoming very London focused, we want to make sure we are a national paper again.”
He
added: “There’s going to be more variety in terms of stories and more
national coverage. The new format means more column inches can be
devoted to news. We are going to have a broader news agenda– we want to
be a community newspaper, like you would have a community newspaper for
Reading or Swindon or whatever.
“We want to cover more than just
your local council – we want to cover crime and court reporting, people
who do amazing and weird stuff and the whole variety of news.”
Reid-Smith
said there will also be more lifestyle, entertainment, leisure and
sport as well as expanded sections on travel, finance and property.
The
first new-look edition comes out on 17 February, will run to 48 pages
and continue to be distributed free through a network of 500 cafés,
bars and bookstores. Circulation will remain at 40,000, with a target
to reach 60,000 by 2006.
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