Nooga.com partners with 6AM City

Chattanooga online news outlet Nooga.com has entered into a partnership with 6AM City as part of the Greenville, South Carolina-based media company’s expansion in the Southeast.

“We’d been evaluating market expansion and Chattanooga looked great on paper,” Ryan Heafy, director of operations for 6AM City, said in a statement Monday. “During our initial visit, we were blown away by the energy and sense of purpose on display everywhere we looked — we knew we wanted to find a way to be part of this community.”

Ryan Johnston, managing director for 6AM City, said it’s clear the two online news outlets share a lot of the same values and a vision for shaping the future of how they inform and empower communities.

Nooga.com founder Barry Large remains involved with the new venture and will join 6AM City in an advisory role. Heafy said ownership of Nooga.com was transferred into 6AM City and he said Large has an investment in 6AM City.

Nooga.com launched in 2011 as a local news and entertainment outlet serving the Chattanooga area and currently has three full-time employees.

“I am immensely proud of what our current and former staff have built and think it’s a great testament to their hard work that 6AM City was so eager to forge this partnership with us,” Large said. “I’ve learned that, in business, it’s rare that you’re presented with such a unique, almost fortuitous, opportunity to allow a company you’ve spent years molding to so effortlessly morph into something bigger and better overnight.”

6AM City’s partnership with Nooga. com creates the sixth market in which it will operate. Existing markets include Greenville, Charleston and Columbia in South Carolina, Asheville, North Carolina, and Lakeland, Florida.

Heafy said a morning online newsletter in each market at 6 a.m. That is carried forward on social media and on the web the rest of the day to drive engagement and conversation, he said.

In most of its markets, 6AM City operates with three full-time staffers, Heafy said. Plans are to launch a new updated website in September in Chattanooga, he said.

Johnston said 6AM City likes to focus on cities that are evolving quickly.

“These cities bring with them excitement, but also a lot of curiosity as to what is happening, what it means, how to get involved and how to address the challenges and opportunities that are associated with this evolution,” Johnston said.