Next month PPF Group will open several coffee shops adjacent to local newsrooms in the Czech Republic in an attempt to make newspapers more accessible to readers and advertisers, reported The New York Times last week.
“As they sip their drinks, visitors will also be able to surf the Web, get help in building social networking profiles or even chat with reporters working right next door putting together their local newspaper,” explains Eric Pfanner of The Times. “The newsrooms-cum-cafes are part of a new venture in so-called hyperlocal journalism, which aims to reconnect newspapers with readers and advertisers by focusing on neighborhood concerns at a neighborhood level…”
PPF’s media strategist says that “there is no option to close the door” between the cafes and the newsrooms. He believes this will give the readers the feeling “that you can touch your editors and tell them what you want.”
So the question on your mind, I’m sure, is, “Is this going to work?” According to PPF, it is and the company is even expanding.
To begin, PPF is planning to publish seven weekly newspapers and 30 Web sites. If the newspapers are a success, they plan to add several more throughout the Czech Republic and possibly even in other Central and Eastern European countries.
This plan doesn’t seem to be foolproof – they may pick up more readers, but will the advertisers jump on board as well? However, it is an interesting concept. I’ve always thought that local papers may be the ones that survive in the end, and the idea of making them hyperlocal just ads to their appeal.
My other question is – and this is a bit off topic and comes from the publicist side of my brain – how will these “news cafes” affect PR in their areas? If I were a PR person working in the Czech Republic, I’d be drinking my morning coffee with the local editors on a weekly basis!
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