The Wellingborough Extra was launched today – becoming the third hyper-local from Extra Newspapers to go live in Northamptonshire this month.
The latest launch follows the arrival of sister papers in the towns Corby and Kettering on 4 April. The fortnightly 24-page titles have a 50p cover price and an initial circulation of 10,500.
Group editor, Judith Halliday, said: ‘The local community is at the heart of each publication. We are committed to bringing positive, good news to communities that have previously been left feeling they no longer have a way of finding out what is going on around them.
‘Circulation areas will be tight and the news content hyper-local. Extra aims to prove that small and local can be beautiful. We will be right there on the corner with the local community – watching, reporting and sharing all the news.”
The papers will also offer recruitment advertising and listings free of charge to encourage small businesses to advertise.
Extra Newspapers managing director, Stuart Parker, said: ‘With the gradual shift in recent years to high advertising rates, the regional press has made it almost impossible for small businesses to communicate effectively with their target audiences.
‘Extra will also be providing value for money advertising rates, so that businesses can quite simply afford to advertise and communicate.”
The paper will be up against Johnston Press‘s Kettering-based Northamptonshire Evening Telegraph, which the publisher announced this week was to become a weekly title in May.
The paper currently circulates in Wellingborough and Corby and the publisher also prints a number of weekly Citizen series titles in the area.
Speaking to Press Gazette earlier this month, Parker said Extra Newspapers did not consider itself to be in competition with Johnston.
‘The Evening Telegraph isn’t competition, we’re not in their league,’he said. ‘I don’t like saying that we’re up against Johnston Press because that would be daft. We can’t take people on like that.’
The titles will be edited by former Derby Telegraph journalist Judith Halliday. Parker said his company was eyeing further launches in the near future.
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