AUJRNL 4970
Extra, Extra
The Shelby County Reporter, founded in 1843, was originally referred to as the Alabama Reporter. Later, the Alabama Reporter was merged with the Shelby County Democrat. Today, the enterprise has grown to six weekly newspapers in addition to four magazines published at different times throughout the year.
Magazine Launches
The two monthly magazines include Shelby Living, launched seven years ago, and Hoover Magazine, launched four years ago. The Chamber of Commerce newsletters are also published in the magazines. The page count each month for the Shelby Living and Hoover Magazine is usually 84 pages.
Profile and Football Magazine are published yearly. Profile is a sort of yearbook for Shelby County. The Football Magazine is a preview of football within the area, and it covers every public and private high school. These four magazines are either sent to Montgomery or Mississippi to be printed, depending on the pricing.
“Our magazine stories are features, feel good stories in the community,” McDowell said. “We are trying to get more into restaurant reviews and home reviews.”
Rich History
Before being bought by Boone Newspapers, the Shelby County Reporter was owned by Marcia Sears. Sears was also the editor of the newspaper and the first female president of the Alabama Press Association. The newspaper group is now owned by Boone Newspapers. Currently, Jim Boone is the chairman of the company. This parent company owns 70 operations throughout the country, mostly in the Southeast.
The Shelby County Newspaper group is part of what is called the inland group, which is comprised of eight to ten newspapers. The Boone Newspapers all work hand in hand. The design team at the Shelby County Newspaper sometimes helps newspapers in North Carolina with their design. Shelby County also designs classifieds for 10 other newspapers, including newspapers in Alabama, Tennessee and North Carolina. The newspaper is sent to Clanton each week to be printed.
The Shelby County Reporter has consistently been recognized for its editorial content, design and web presence. According to the Boone Newspaper website, “The Shelby County Reporter won the Alabama Press Association’s General Excellence for large weekly newspapers in 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, and 2012.”
And, based on history, no matter what the challenge, the newspaper group will continue to cover the news. “The Shelby County Reporter has never missed a publication in history,” Neal Wagner, managing editor, said. “There was one time during the Civil War when they ran out of paper, so they wrote the whole newspaper on wallpaper and read it in the courthouse.”
Six Newspapers and More
The six weekly newspapers under the Shelby County Newspaper umbrella include the Shelby County Reporter, Clanton Advertiser, Alabaster Reporter, Pelham Reporter, Helena Reporter and 280 Reporter.
According to Katie McDowell, general manager of Shelby County Newspapers, Shelby County has grown significantly in the last 20 years, especially Pelham and Alabaster.
Each newspaper goes out on Wednesday. The latest additions to the group are the Helena Reporter and 280 Reporter, which were launched in April.
The group has a “digital first” mentality. This means that once a story is written, it is automatically published online, then goes to print. McDowell said she believes this is a way to “serve different readers and gives the newspaper a feel of a daily paper.”
These six newspapers are sold in stands for 50 cents a paper. While there are six different newspapers and four magazines, including Shelby Living, Hoover Magazine, Profile and Football Magazine, the community aspect comes alive because of the staff writers.
There is only one reporter per town newspaper. For example, staff writer Brianna Harris is the main reporter for the Pelham Reporter. Freelancers and community columnists, also contribute to the publications. The group employs 27 full-time staffers. This includes seven people in the newsroom, editor of the two monthly magazines, and eight people in the editorial department. Two others focus on running the office.
Writers for Shelby County Newspapers have a 15-story goal each week. However, 12 to 13 is usually more realistic. These stories range from 300 to 500 words with one to two sources.
“We try to create a healthy meal for our readers each week,” McDowell said. “There are usually two government stories, one crime story, a church story and education each week”
Most of the story ideas come from the community, but there are certain stories that take months to research and produce. These enterprise stories can range from technology entering the classroom to ongoing legislation that will affect the county.
“Readers send in ideas a lot. They will come to me in coffee shops or wherever else to give story ideas,” Harris said.
Neal Wagner sees bright future for community journalism
Neal Wagner is the managing editor of Shelby County Newspapers. These publications include the Shelby County Reporter, Clanton Advertiser, Alabaster Reporter, Pelham Reporter, Helena Reporter and 280 Reporter. Wagner received a journalism degree from Auburn University in 2007. He has spent the past seven years as a journalist in Alabama and Mississippi.
CS: What led to your career at the Shelby County Reporter?
NW: After graduating from Auburn University with a journalism degree in 2007, I worked at a newspaper in Columbus, Mississippi, for two years before I came to the Shelby County Reporter as a staff writer in 2009. I got promoted to city editor in 2010 and then to the managing editor position in 2014.
CS: How did you know you wanted to become a journalist?
NW: Writing is something I have always been interested in, and I really enjoy getting to learn about and cover issues on a local level.
CS: What changes have you seen in the industry?
NW: Coming from a large daily paper in Columbus to a smaller weekly community paper here, I think journalism is definitely trending toward hyper-local community coverage. Over the years, I’ve definitely seen a decline among the larger regional papers while it seems the papers offering more local content have been steadily growing. I’ve also seen a shift toward online content and ad revenue with the rise of social media outlets among papers. Readers use social media on a daily, sometimes hourly, basis, and I think newspapers as a whole have done a pretty good job of engaging readers and providing content to them through those social media avenues.
CS: Do you think community journalism is more beneficial for young writers?
NW: I think community journalism is definitely good experience for any writer, regardless of age. It allows you to get connected with a community in a way that’s hard to achieve at a paper that has more of a regional or national focus. When you cover community issues, you get to know a city or town better than most of the people who live there, and the residents start to look to you as their source for news that matter to them.
CS: What do you think the future of community journalism is?
NW: Community journalism will definitely continue to grow, since people will always be interested and engaged in the things happening in their own cities. As technology grows, I think it is important for newspapers to always keep an eye on what avenues, social media or otherwise, readers are using to get their news and then use those avenues to provide content to the readers.
Neal Wagner, managing editor
A day in the life of a staff writer
The Shelby County Reporter’s main office in Columbiana may have the feel of a small town newspaper, but this enterprise consists of six community newspapers and four magazines.
With this many newspapers, the group came up with a plan to cover local news in the most efficient way.
Each newspaper has one writer covering the specific town. Briana Harris is the staff writer responsible for the Pelham Reporter. The other newspapers in this group include the Shelby County Reporter, Clanton Advertiser, Alabaster Reporter, Helena Reporter and 280 Reporter.
Harris graduated from the University of Alabama with a major in journalism.
Upon graduation, she began her journalism career at the Decatur Daily as a writer for two years. She then took some time away from the newspaper to work at a marketing firm until she accepted the staff position.
In the newsroom, Mondays are considered the heavy deadline day, as all stories are due for Wednesday’s paper. Writers can publish their stories online as soon as they are done. A quarter of these stories appear in print, and the rest are placed on the newspaper’s website, http://www.shelbycountyreporter.com.
“On Mondays, I get to the newsroom right at 8 a.m.,” Harris said. “I’m also in charge of laying out the Pelham Reporter as well as reporting for it.”
After each story is submitted and chosen for print, the layout begins. Once the stories are laid out, Harris begins working with the designers to layout all of the photos in the newspaper.
While Mondays mostly consist of deadlines and layouts, Harris tries to get in a story for the upcoming week as well.
“Layout is usually done around 2 p.m. After that I try and go out and find a story for the next week, so I’ll leave the office and head to Pelham,” Harris said.
For a staff writer, each day can be unpredictable. On Tuesdays and Wednesdays, Harris is not usually found in the office. Instead, she is on the road to Pelham, finding stories in unlikely places.
“Week to week, people are calling me all the time with story ideas,” Harris said. “While I’m there, I also take spot photos, which is usually just a headshot or simple picture of the person or event.”
The staff also meets on a weekly basis. Each Tuesday, the entire office comes together, and staff writers discuss the main story in their town for that week. At this meeting, each reporter also coordinates with the photographer. The photographers at the Shelby County Reporter take all the main photos. On Wednesday, the paper is printed and goes to the newsstand. On Thursdays and Fridays in the office, Harris continues to report some stories, but most of her day is spent publishing stories online and planning for the upcoming week.
Staff writers at the newspaper try to write approximately 15 stories per week. Harris’s
news articles can be found at, http://www.pelhamreporter.com.
“Enterprise stories are really the only stories I find. Most other ones just come to me,”
Harris said.
Enterprise stories can take months to finish because they go beyond covering main events in a town. Instead, the reporters find these stories on their own. This type of reporting urges journalists to dig deeper and find stories in uncommon places.
Whether it’s an enterprise story or covering events, their days are filled with reporting.
A staff writer in a small town newspaper, Harris suggested, can be the best way to learn about each aspect of working in a newsroom.