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New audience demands in an ever-evolving media landscape has prompted AIM Media Texas to reduce its print editions for The Monitor, Valley Morning Star and The Brownsville Herald from five days a week to a semi-weekly format publishing only Wednesdays and Saturdays, which would serve as a weekend edition.
In line with a multi-phase process that has aimed to meet readers where they are, beginning first with regionalizing coverage in 2020 then with launching MyRGV.com in 2021, this change is part of ongoing efforts to diversify all platforms that provide services to the Rio Grande Valley community.
AUDIENCE FOCUS
This is also part of AIM Media Texas’ efforts to fulfill its mission of creating a well-informed public by following its audience where they prefer to get their news. It’s a longstanding model that began with yesteryear when strategizing newspaper rack locations where people gathered more abundantly was the most sophisticated means of attracting readers, to today when mobile devices are now the largest source of readership.
Daily e-editions available via the newspapers’ apps and website, MyRGV.com, will continue to be published Monday through Saturday.
These changes will take effect Saturday, Sept. 9.
EVOLVING DELIVERY CHANNELS
Today’s market realities have made it difficult to keep and recruit independent contractors who deliver print editions. As a result, AIM Media Texas has begun transitioning into a new delivery model that will incorporate mail to ensure same-day delivery.
“We have already begun delivering some of our papers through the U.S. Postal Service. Same-day delivery by mail is now more reliable than trying to service routes which have no carrier, a trend we expect to continue,” Publisher and AIM Media Texas Regional Vice President Stephan Wingert said, adding that the ability to meet the mission of a 100-year-old business is directly related to focusing limited resources on digital products for the next 100 years.
“As someone who grew up in the industry, I understand how important it is for our days to begin with the paper and a morning cup of coffee. I believe in the power of the written word and understand what print means to this community, so this wasn’t an easy decision but it was the right one. We maintain these values by embracing our future, because there’s no century-old company that lasts that long without evolving.”
This also follows AIM Media Texas’ announcement earlier this year that the daily print editions would reduce to five days a week, not printing Mondays and Tuesdays.
DIGITAL READERSHIP GROWTH
Readership for the Monday and Tuesday e-editions, however, increased by about 50% on average since those changes took effect. This coupled with MyRGV.com and related digital publications scoring around a million monthly users indicate that interest in digital products is increasing beyond what print publishing can achieve.
To benefit advertisers and help grow their business, AIM Media Texas has also been growing its marketing arm by providing a robust array of digital advertising methods, and is now among the more sophisticated media outlets for these services.
COMMITMENT TO LOCAL NEWS COVERAGE
The newsrooms, meanwhile, will continue to strive for public accountability as reporters, photographers and editors work to build regional coverage of South Texas.
Wingert said it’s imperative to strengthen the support for local journalism and highlighted the years of service each newspaper has dedicated to covering the Valley, with the Herald printing since 1892 and the Star and Monitor since 1909.
“We delivered the news to you when the Titanic sank, when Pearl Harbor was attacked, when Kennedy and Martin Luther King Jr. were assassinated, when we landed on the moon, when 9/11 happened, when the world stopped because of a global pandemic, and we’re going to continue delivering the news to you,” Wingert said. “The news will never cease. We’re just building a new future.”
Read the daily e-editions for The Monitor, Star and Herald at MyRGV.com or via their respective mobile apps. MyRGV.com subscribers get instant access to the e-editions as well as to all web features. Readers can subscribe by visiting the website.
