We love The Bedford Clanger! It’s our longest running newspaper, and we’ve been delighted to watch it grow from a little newspaper in 2011 to a whopping great success in 2013. It’s always interesting and every issue looks a treat. It has made us want to pop down to Bedford a few times as there’s clearly so much going on there.
The driving force behind this great local newspaper is Erica Roffe, who’s here to tell us the story of the Bedford Clanger as it relaunches as a quarterly mini. Over to you, Erica…
Over the past two and a half years we’ve worked closely with the Newspaper Club to develop our little indie newspaper from a 16 page fanzine with a print-run of just 1,000 to a mini newspaper distributed to 25,000 people. We’ve gained a lot of knowledge on the way (most of it in very, very steep learning curves) and have met some amazing people who have found out about us via the Newspaper Club’s blog.
Since June 2011 we’ve printed on almost every format going. We started out as a classic tabloid, graduated to the improved tabloid and we’ve even ventured into broadsheet territory for a picture special we ran in September 2013. The lovely people at the Newspaper Club have guided us every step of the way, helping us source exactly the right paper stock, advising on layouts and even proof-reading for us when we misspelt the month of the publication on the front cover…
This month sees us re-launch The Bedford Clanger as a 40 page mini newspaper and we’re so excited about the new design, format and features – and about reaching thousands more readers. We’re working with a Get Smart Promotions to distribute the Clanger throughout Bedfordshire, Hertfordshire, Buckinghamshire and Milton Keynes too. Our aim is to make out-of-towners want to visit, make visitors want to stay and make residents proud to live here.
The new-look Clanger will be a quarterly publication with day-to-day content being published on our blog and via twitter and Facebook. We are also working with Bedford’s Big Local App to create a Bedford Clanger Listing app which will feature our definitive what’s on guide.
As you can see, the organic development of The Bedford Clanger continues. We’ve got lots of ideas and schemes for the future, including some that feature the Newspaper Club, so watch this space…
Find the Clanger’s at thebedfordclanger.wordpress.com or follow their adventures on Twitter @bedfordclanger.