Maine’s Midcoast Villager turns one. 📰
They built a newspaper, a cafe, and a thriving ad business in one year.
Good morning everyone. I’m talking to friend-of-the-letter Eric Wareheim about his new book, Steak House, at Rizzoli Bookstore on October 13th. You should come.
Today’s letter includes: a conversation with a local Maine newspaper’s editor-in-chief, three presidents are joining Substack, a New York artist commissioned by a New York boutique, and New York Magazine is hiring a beauty writer.
A year ago, The Boston Globe published a story about four local Maine newspapers rolling up to create one new publication: Midcoast Villager. I was intrigued that the business plan didn’t only include a weekly paper, but also book publishing and a newspaper-owned coffee shop (like Air Mail). “We are leaning into humanity and betting on a future that believes that kindness and respect for each other is at the root of our community,” owner Reade Brower said in the company’s news release last year.
Today, for the paper’s one-year anniversary, I spoke to Willy Blackmore, Midcoast Villager’s editor-in-chief, about a new print product that they’ve added to the paper – a mini magazine called Midcoast Living that was an instant magnet for advertisers. If you happen to be near the Villager Cafe, you should tell us how the free donuts are at the anniversary celebration.
EMILY: It’s been about a year since Midcoast Villager’s rollup. How has it been going?
WILLY BLACKMORE: Really good! We got out 52ish issues, which definitely feels like a big accomplishment. And in this calendar year we’ve really gone big with thematic special issues. Some, like Midcoast Living, are built around legacy ad products. We also publish solutions-journalism-driven supplements on ways people are working to solve big local problems, like coastal climate change or the difficult labor market. I’m really proud of the work we’ve done on those editorially, and they are proving to be a success, too, from an ad sales and sponsorship standpoint.
“We oversold this special issue compared to a home and garden one. We also have ads ranging from local banks to every kind of biz involved with home building, from excavation to custom window treatments.”
ES: The Midcoast Living issue that came out today is beautiful. What was your ad strategy like for it, and what kinds of brands got involved?
WB: September is the biggest month for home sales here, which I was surprised to learn because the real estate market sort of comes alive in the late spring and summer. But I guess that’s when people sort of decide to put up or shut up. So we wanted to time this to that peak of the housing market and make something that editorially would be very attractive to real estate agencies and other related fields, too: the building trades, local craftspeople, various retailers, banks.
It seems to have connected well with those clients. We oversold this special issue compared to a home and garden one. We also have ads ranging from local banks to every kind of biz involved with home building, from excavation to custom window treatments. There’s a good amount of real estate ads too.