It's official: The Detroit Free Press and The Detroit News, will become the first major U.S. newspapers to cease seven-day home delivery. The news was announced by the Detroit Media Partnership, the agency controlling the interests of both the Gannett and Media News papers, at a press conference this morning in the Motor City.
The confirmation comes after several days of speculation, first reported by The Wall Street Journal, about a fundamental change in the business model for the struggling Free Press and News. The papers work together in all matters other than editorial under a Joint Operating Agreement. The change is expected to happen in the first quarter of 2009.
The highlights of the plan:
• Goodbye to every day delivery: Both papers will cease seven-day home delivery to all subscribers as they begin transitioning to more online delivery of news.
• Hello to three-day delivery: The JOA will instead focus on Thursday and Friday delivery of both papers and Sunday delivery of the Free Press only. Those days are the most lucrative for advertising and have often been considered in the newspaper world as the “money” days for both sales and circulation.
• Get it on the newsstand: The papers will offer single copy editions six days of the week; only the Free Press will publish a Sunday single copy edition.
• A new pricing model for subscriptions and a push to online: Seven days of access to an e-edition would also include the three days of home delivery. [Click for MORE]
> Detroit newspapers fewer days for home delivery; union says 9 pct. job cuts also planned
> Hunke says 'a day of reckoning coming'; In historic move, Detroit ends most home delivery
> Text of Detroit CEO Hunke's memo to employees
> Detroit News' story on the changes | Free Press' story
> Comments from Free Press editor Paul Anger
> Letter to News readers from the editor and publisher
> Doing the math on Detroit newspapers' big gamble
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