The i newspaper is launching a new weekend edition which editor Oly Duff says will do away with the “breathless pace” of the existing Saturday newspaper by adding in more feature articles.
The iWeekend will launch this Saturday, but unlike most weekend newspapers it will not include any supplements. Duff says this is a result of listening to what readers want and responding.
Sales of Saturday’s i have risen by more than 13,600 (ABC figures comparing March 2016 with August 2017) since Johnston Press bought the title from the Independent in February last year.
Duff said: “While some Sunday newspapers’ sales are soft, the Saturday quality market has thrived, and nowhere more so than i”.
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He said the new edition would be a “lively, engaging read with a few more treats”, adding: “We have not torn up the good things about our current Saturday paper – but we have addressed a few weaknesses.
“For starters: a breathless pace and too few features, on a day when readers sometimes like to lean back over a cuppa, and revel in a superb piece of prose, or gripping human yarn.
“So we have kept up the high story count, but interspersed the many short articles (so fundamental to i’s DNA) with short reads that change the pace. Your iWeekend should now last more of the weekend.”
The iWeekend will include:
- A new “Life” features section containing the “softer side of the weekend”
- A new nine-page “Culture” section including interviews with authors, seven-day TV guide and going out guide
- More short weekend reads “dotted throughout news pages to change the pace”
- 17 pages of sport
- Revamped “Money & Business” pages
- Bigger infographics
- An “improved” news review section
A dummy edition of the new look iWeekend
Conservative Home executive editor Mark Wallace will write a fortnighly column on Brexit for the i midweek, with the first published on Monday.
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