The Demise of The Birmingham Post & Mail

[Biosonic]

Apologies Woody if you don't want this here but I think it is an important thread and The Post especially is often cited in our thread.

Move it if you want

[Biosonic]

Originally Posted by Biosonic

We may as well give up having any local paper now, let alone a quality one:

http://www.thestirrer.co.uk/post-edi...e-2608091.html

Someone needs to take it out of Trinity Mirror's hands quickly, and the editors need to grow some balls. The only way out of this is to make both papers relevant, daily and get rid of some of the tackier aspects of their overhaul. The Mail IMHO needs to become a decent tabloid EVENING Mail and The Post needs to keep its standards up. How can a business & poilitics paper operate weekly?

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[Biosonic]

Originally Posted by Erebus555

But every local paper is suffering from dramatic falls in readership. I believe this may be due to a decline in interest by people in their local area. There are going to have to be some major decisions made to keep these papers afloat - whether it be shedding staff or readjusting distribution. I do agree about the Birmingham Mail. People like to read quality articles and pieces and the Mail is just acting like Birmingham's tabloid paper. In fact, I can't see why they shouldn't merge the two papers - taking the more important and popular aspects of each paper and using them in a new amalgamated form. I don't really see why Birmingham needs to have two local papers under the same company that report the same thing.

It's not even local papers that are suffering, we're seeing national papers suffer too. The Guardian, for example, recently announced that they will be unable to operate for another 5 years if they continue to make the losses that they have made over the past couple of years. The loss of the Guardian would also mean the loss of The Sunday Observer (the world's oldest Sunday newspaper, I believe). I think they've actually mooted dropping the paper if it means reducing losses.

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[Biosonic]

Originally Posted by fruit&nut

They were talking about this on the radio the other day.

The reality is that people can now get news on the radio, telly, i-pod, phone, 3G laptop etc etc etc and are no longer feeling the need to buy a "paper" newspaper as well.

Sadly the poor editorial staff of these papers have failed to realise that they need to offer something over and above the regular news to spark interest to buy their rags.

Times are changing, there's been a paradigm shift in news media and i suspect we will soon see the end of written paper media.

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[Biosonic]

Originally Posted by markmcd1976

The fact the the Mail is out of date by the time it's printed, has no exclusives, especially on the sport front and has dumbed down are all reasons for it's demise.

It's very sad, but it needs to make itself more relevant to the city and the region it serves. The website could also be alot better.

The way forward maybe more features in the paper copy, with more up to date news on the website.

One thing is certain, it can't sustain circlulation losses of 10% a year for much longer.

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[Erebus555]

I think this is a very good idea for a thread, and it's definitely something worth discussing. I've made my points already so I think I'll see what others want to say before saying anything else.

[Biosonic]

I've thought about it a bit more and don't think the Mail going to a morning paper is a bad thing - as others say the internet is used for up-to-date news, but I do think we ought to have a decent tabloid (The Mail) and a quality paper (The Post). They need to do more stuff that only papers can do - like intelligent comementary and in-depth stuff as well as analysis, local info etc

[ROYAL BLUE]

Well, apart from sports news, the mail holds little interest for me.

I think generally though, there is no market for local papers. For example, last weeks Tamworth Hearld's front page story was "4 injured in car crash"! Seriously, why should we pay for such irrelivent stories.

[Telfordboy]

My local paper is increasingly terrible, they always find some way to link national stories back to Shropshire in the most tenuous way possible. That coupled with sensationalism, little englander and increasingly right wing stance puts me right off. Also the letters pages are full of crackpots and quasi rasicts, no thanks.

[DE51GNR]

This isn't the place to discuss this. This is skyscrapercity.com

[Erebus555]

Then you're ruling out 75% of the threads and topics already being discussed on this forum.

[i_like_concrete]

Originally Posted by Biosonic

I've thought about it a bit more and don't think the Mail going to a morning paper is a bad thing - as others say the internet is used for up-to-date news, but I do think we ought to have a decent tabloid (The Mail) and a quality paper (The Post). They need to do more stuff that only papers can do - like intelligent comementary and in-depth stuff as well as analysis, local info etc

Well in that case they need to sack everyone who currently works for them, because I've never seen anything remotely intelligent written in either the Mail or the Post. The journalists are all people who seem to have left school with a GCSE in English Language and decided to make a career out of it.

Originally Posted by ROYAL BLUE

Well, apart from sports news, the mail holds little interest for me.

I think generally though, there is no market for local papers. For example, last weeks Tamworth Hearld's front page story was "4 injured in car crash"! Seriously, why should we pay for such irrelivent stories.

It's so utterly ironic that you say that, because realistically it is local news that matters most. Local papers are crap because they are failing to be relevant, there's nothing to say they can't be, no reason why with a clever editor and some decent journalists they can't provoke a proper debate, tap into really important local issues. I think the problem is nobody intelligent actually wants to work for a paper like the Birmingham Mail or Post.

[DE51GNR]

Re: Post #11. If we're talking about the Post and Mail building, no problem. But we're not !!!

[Erebus555]

Originally Posted by DE51GNR

Re: Post #11. If we're talking about the Post and Mail building, no problem. But we're not !!!

My point still stands. Anyway, we're already verging off the topic of the thread.

[Erebus555]

Originally Posted by i_like_concrete

Well in that case they need to sack everyone who currently works for them, because I've never seen anything remotely intelligent written in either the Mail or the Post. The journalists are all people who seem to have left school with a GCSE in English Language and decided to make a career out of it.

I disagree. Whilst I do believe that the Mail does have a bad habit of poor writing - I believe this is down to their tabloid nature and sensationalism. That's no different with The Sun or News of the World, however. But the Post can deliver some quality pieces - although I can't expect it to consistently match the quality that you see in the national broadsheets as all the better journalists end up there eventually.

It's so utterly ironic that you say that, because realistically it is local news that matters most. Local papers are crap because they are failing to be relevant, there's nothing to say they can't be, no reason why with a clever editor and some decent journalists they can't provoke a proper debate, tap into really important local issues. I think the problem is nobody intelligent actually wants to work for a paper like the Birmingham Mail or Post.

The papers were nearly instrumental into giving us an idea into the day to day happenings in the Birmingham Gateway project's early days. Without, say, The Birmingham Post constantly giving information on these projects, we'd have been in the dark about so many things. The same with the MG Rover collapse; they covered this very well. If anyone wanted to have an informed debate, the Birmingham Post could deliver the facts.

But I really do believe that the local papers do not interest residents like they used to. I think the civic pride just isn't there anymore. And many people won't be interested in even debating a topic unless it affects them directly or it is right up on their doorstep. Something happening in Quinton will probably not interest someone living in Bordesley Green. The reason why the likes of Vale Mail are so popular is because it deals with news that is always on their doorstep, unlike the Post and Mail which cover a vast area now.

[SimonTheSoundMan]

Let's just say, they are not as bad as the Express and Star.

They have a monopoly, their own political agenda, and their reporting is awful.

[SimonTheSoundMan]

Post and Mail may be loosing between 60-80 jobs soon. I know they are in consultation to see what will happen to both news papers, as if this happens there is no way they can produce enough content at a decent quality.

Unsure how much I should be saying online, however it is not good.

Perhaps the Express and Star should buy them out, close both papers, then bring in their standard trash, then buy out every other paper in Brum and do the same. It's what they did in the Black Country.

[NewTroll]

The same company owns the Coventry Telegraph - they publish it in the morning now, and not only is it pointlessly out of date, its standard of journalism is awful. They rarely cover much local news and have filled the thing up with adverts and dumb articles about make-up or cooking. Most of their articles are filled with mistakes and horrendously over-sensational. It's a shame, as it used to be OK.

[markmcd1976]

Thought the news today that the Evening Standard will become free in the next couple of months and increase it's circlulation to 600000 from around 250000 is an interesting tactic.

Is it something the Mail could do to survive? Triple its circulation, replace the lost reveue from the cover price (about £10k an edition) with increase adverting and turn around the terminal decline??

It would shift it more upmarket, as the distribution would be targetted, making it even more attractive to advertisers?

I know it isn't about skyscrapers but there you go!

[Erebus555]

I don't think it is even possible to put more adverts in the Birmingham Mail! Yeah it is an interesting tactic though, let's see how it works out for them.