New era for The Local website begins today

As we prepare to welcome a new year, The Niagara-on-the-Lake Local is also preparing for a bright future for news in our community, with an exciting announcement of a new partnership that will benefit our readers and advertisers.

By Thursday morning, you will see The NOTL Local website looking very different. We are thrilled to now be operating our hyperlocal news website under the umbrella of Village Media, which operates successful community news websites across Ontario, Canada, the U.S. and around the world. The print edition of The Local will continue as an independent newspaper, still owned by the two of us, Penny Coles and Karen Skeoch.

An Ontario-based company, Village Media specializes in optimizing the reach of smaller community newspaper websites, and in addition to our local stories, will be able to offer so much more digital information than we can include in our print edition, all in one place. Online, notllocal.com will be an up-to-the-minute community news site providing lifestyle articles, news from across the region, obituaries (free to list), weather, a newsletter highlighting local stories, a business directory, a custom-built polling survey, horoscopes, a crossword puzzle . . . and that’s only a fraction of what will be available on the NOTL Local website.

A bit of Village Media history: the network of local news websites launched in 2000 in Sault Ste. Marie with SooToday, and has, since its beginnings, been dedicated to offering online, hyperlocal digital community news. The NOTL Local is now their 20th owned and operated website in Ontario alone — with more than 60 sites worldwide — and while partnering with them is new and exciting for us, we are also bringing something to the table that is new for them.

Village Media has chosen The Local to be the first of its news outlets with a partner that continues to offer a print edition. For those of you who still like the feel of holding a newspaper in your hands, it isn’t going anywhere. It will arrive in your Wednesday mail as it always has, supported by a Village Media website more comprehensive than anything we could provide our readers and advertisers on our own.

This partnership allows the two companies to offer a sustainable print edition and website, serving the community through a collaboration by those of us who care passionately about delivering news to our readers. It also allows our local businesses to expand their advertising opportunities in ways our former website just wasn’t equipped to do. Village Media is making an investment in this community that will provide services we, as a small newspaper, could not have dreamed of offering.

All of our writers, photographers and community members whose contributions to our print editions have been so valuable will continue to be an integral part of this independently-owned newspaper, and will also find their great stories, columns and photographs now shared with a much wider digital audience to appreciate their skills and the information they present. We also hope to bring more talented journalists on board to help us meet our goal of providing daily news.

All of this comes at a time when the print newspaper industry is facing tremendous challenges. This exciting new partnership with Village Media positions us to deliver integrated community daily news now, and into the future.

Penny Coles

Karen Skeoch

The Local