The Commercial Re-envisioned

Welcome to your new newspaper! That’s something that no one has been able to say since 1881 when the Pine Bluff Commercial was first put into motion.

In a world where one would be hard-pressed to put their finger on some aspect of life that hasn’t changed considerably in those 139 years, newspapers – including this one — have stayed more or less unchanged.

And that was OK for most of those years. Editors and reporters put news on the pages, which the public eagerly digested, and advertising people sold ads that surrounded the news. Reading about last night’s city council meeting? Across the page, we’d like you to consider the men’s suits that we have on sale, or the new line of Buicks that just arrived in our showroom. It was a perfect environment. Until it wasn’t.

Not that newspapers didn’t survive other scares. When radio came along, that was the end of newspapers, so we were told. The same with television. But then the internet happened. And like many of the tales described in book, The Innovator’s Dilemma, the online world was a game changer – not only for newspapers but for a host of other media.

But some things haven’t changed. Readers are still eager for news, and at a time when anyone can post anything to any number of social media sites, we believe there is more focus on reliable news delivered by people who have been trained in news gathering.

So while one part of that earlier equation is still intact – the desire for news – the advertising element has become unreliable in many ways, meaning that advertising revenue just cannot sustain a product that, since 1881, in our instance, has not substantially changed.

Enter Walter Hussman, whose company, WEHCO Media, is the new owner of The Commercial. Instead of struggling against the technological winds of change, he has embraced them. Hence, the reimagined Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, as well as other newspapers he owns, and now The Commercial – all of which use the internet to deliver replica editions to readers.

How has that changed the landscape? Well, for several weeks, until the transition is completed, there will be Pine Bluff Commercial pages tucked inside the Democrat-Gazette and delivered to your driveway – just like the old days.

But one of the benefits of this embrace of technology is that printing a newspaper is not necessary. That eliminates the need for newsprint, ink, pressroom workers and then the enormous distribution of those papers across the state. The savings there are more than substantial, and coupled with the cost of subscriptions, a new and improved newspaper can still be delivered to readers each day. No late papers, no wet papers, no going outside in your robe looking for your paper. Right there on your tablet, bright and early, every single day.

We are excited to be part of this new venture.

Honestly, this could easily have been a farewell note to readers that this would be the final day of publication. Instead, we are eager to start this newest chapter in the history of the Pine Bluff Commercial, and by that, we mean that we need to get back to the real work of newspapering, which is covering the news. Check us out. We are here to stay!