News International Publishes Four Great Ads Celebrating That Print Newspapers Are Here To Stay

Philip Stone April 16, 2008

It’s very seldom that one gushes over a print advertising campaign, even more so one targeting the long-life of print newspapers, but News International has excelled itself with four great ads promoting not only its UK national newspapers, but the general longevity of the print newspaper industry.

The full-page ads appeared in the April 11 edition of the UK’s Press Gazette trade weekly in an issue that devoted 24 pages to the winners of the British Press Awards contest – the edition sure to be read by all the UKs news outlets themselves and many of the various ancillary organizations.

The ad concept was simple -- show a fake front page of each of the newspapers for a date far into the future. The tabloid Sun’s was June 10, 2038 and headlines that England finally won the soccer World Cup  72 years after its last such win in 1966. Well, advertising marketing people are allowed to dream! Each ad in the lower right corner featured the headline, “Investing £650 million in the future of newspapers” and the copy read simply, “We believe in the power of print. That’s why we just opened three next generation print plants to produce high quality full color newspapers. So tomorrow’s front pages are here today.”

The ad for The Times from March 5, 2043 headlines that London pedestrians will have to pay a congestion charge to walk in London – a play on the current congestion charge for driving automobiles in the city center.  For The Sunday Times of March 16, 2058, the headline is an “Outcry over Heathrow Terminal 17”. London’s Heathrow Airport recently opened its Terminal Five – disastrous, lost baggage, hundreds of canceled flights, two top British Airways executives fired -- but given all that it seems, if we are to believe the headline, that another 12 terminals are still to be built!

And for the UK’s best selling newspaper, the tabloid Sunday News of the World the March 19, 2063 headline Tells of Amy “Winehouse In Meals-On-Wheels Bust Up” – Meals on Wheels is a charity that delivers hot meals to housebound elderly people! The newspaper also promotes its “World Exclusive” of “Immortality Drug Discovered.”

All good fun but there is a serious message here. With all the doom and gloom stories facing newspapers today, Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp has made a huge investment in the future of print, at least in the UK.  It has built three “shining cathedrals” to print, and the business plan calls for not only printing News International’s own titles but competitive titles, too. The fact the headlines are from so far in the future gives us the not-so-subtle message that these newspapers are going to be around for a long time to come.

It’s a great positive message, beautifully and simply told, and one that should not be lost on the industry. Hopefully Murdoch is right and Philip Meyer is wrong – Meyer in his 2004 book “The Vanishing Newspaper”, predicted that the final copy of the last US newspaper will appear one day in 2043.

And there’s another positive newspaper story, this time from the Middle East. A brand new English language newspaper hits the streets in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) April 17 and its importance should not be underestimated. It’s called The National, published in Abu Dhabi, and its editor is Martin Newland, former editor of the UK Daily Telegraph.

He has been busy the past year recruiting the best Fleet Street journalists he could entice, plus a few from the US, Canada, South Africa, and Australia to join him in the UAE where the pay for such expatriates is very high and the taxes low or non-existent. But there is also going to be major culture shock for those high-flyers and one question that may be tied to the newspaper’s success is how long many of those people will stick around for the long-haul.

The National is Abu Dhabi’s first  English language daily, a national newspaper owned by the Abu Dhabi Media Company, founded in  June 2007, by the government as a holding company for its many media interests, and financed by Mubadala, one of the world’s wealthiest investment funds. The intention is that its influence will flow over borders and it will be felt throughout the Middle East. Its main competition is probably the English language Gulf News published in neighboring Dubai which is said to have beefed up its coverage awaiting its competitor.

On the editorial side The National has around 200 people, including stringers and some 30 foreign correspondents that will produce a broadsheet of around 80 pages of news, business, arts, culture and sports. Newland, who has been on-site since August, 2007, said he believes it could be the last major newspaper launch in history although go tell that to some Indian entrepreneurs!

Deputy Editor Hassan Fattah, a Californian of Iraqi heritage who has reported from the Middle East for the New York Times, said that in the local market the idea of being government-owned is ok. He says the government sees itself “as a driver of change”.

Newland said, "The role of The National is to reflect society, help that society evolve and, perhaps most importantly, promote the bedrock traditions and virtues that must be preserved even in times of change, and that is why we have called our paper The National." That’s tough to decipher but it appears to mean change is ok but traditions and values must be upheld. Where he will need all his skills as editor is when “evolving” comes up against the “traditions and values”. Also, how will the newspaper cover such stories as strikes (a very sensitive subject since the majority of people in Abu Dhabi are foreign workers), and only from such coverage will we  really learn the newspaper’s true pedigree.

The signals are good. The Abu Dhabi leadership has said many times that it wants to have a higher profile on the world stage and it understands, therefore, that its media content must meet world standards. Thus The National is there to raise that bar. Newland’s main job will be to ensure the newspaper stays firmly on that tightrope.