The Mail, Metro and i titles will between them offer £3m worth of free advertising to small businesses who are struggling to stay afloat because of the coronavirus crisis.
The Daily Mail and General Trust is offering £3,000 worth of advertising each to 1,000 companies.
The adverts will appear across DMGT’s four print titles, including the Daily Mail and Mail Online, with additional online space on the Mail Online and Metro websites.
It follows the publisher founding a new charity called Mail Force which on 28 April dramatically intervened in the PPE supplies crisis and flew a plane loaded with £1m worth of coveralls and masks for NHS and care workers into Heathrow Airport.
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The fund has now raised £6.7m – including £1.7m from readers – to continue sourcing protective equipment.
The free advertising scheme opens for applications on Wednesday and is being run in partnership with the Federation of Small Businesses.
Martin Smith, Mail Metro Media’s executive director of direct sales, said: “Businesses are facing the toughest challenges imaginable and we are committed to supporting them as best we can.
“As a company, we match our words with action, which is why we are providing £3m of free advertising for hundreds of SMEs, who are so vital to this country’s economy.”
FSB national chairman Mike Cherry said this was a “generous” and “important, free initiative” for which his members would be “hugely grateful”.
Successful applicants will be matched with a dedicated account manager at Mail Metro Media, the commercial division of the titles.
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