A Spanish Weekly for U.S. Dailies

By: Dave Astor The United States has a large Spanish-speaking population, but many newspapers have neither the staff nor the money to put together special content for Latino readers.

That's where the syndicated Fronteras de la Noticia weekly comes in. "There's a niche and a need," said co-publisher Kerry Slagle. "The fastest-growing demographic in the U.S. is the Latino market."

Fronteras -- which celebrates its first anniversary of publication in November -- is produced by the Danilo Black company in Mexico and sold by Universal Press Syndicate of Kansas City. Fronteras now appears in 14 U.S. markets, and looks somewhat different in each. That's because newspapers can sell local ads in Fronteras and generate two pages of local copy for the weekly color tabloid.

Twenty-two other pages are devoted to non-local content -- including Latin-American and Mexican news, feature stories, entertainment coverage, a women's section, service information, comics, games, puzzles, sports news, and other content. When these 22 pages are combined with local copy and ads, Fronteras expands to 32 pages a week in many markets.

Slagle said Danilo Black's writers, editors, and designers "understand what Latinos want," which translates into a highly graphic format and articles (other than a long cover story) that run about 350 words.

"Latino readers, like Anglo readers, are very busy," said Slagle, who co-publishes Fronteras with Danilo Black executives Eduardo Danilo and Roberto Madero. Elena Rodriguez is the editorial coordinator and Bill Weir is sales manager.

Slagle -- who's also president of Atlantic Syndication, Universal's international division -- said most clients print Fronteras as a separate publication offered free at newsstands, stores, restaurants, churches, schools, and other heavy-traffic locations.

Fronteras is available for any newspaper to distribute, but clients tend to be based in markets that are at least 10 to 15% Latino or have more than 20,000 Latino residents.

One client, the Albuquerque (N.M.) Journal, distributes about 11,000 copies of Fronteras -- and only receives 1,000 or so returns. "We've gotten quite a few positive comments about it from readers," said Dan Herrera, assistant managing editor at the Journal. He told E&P that many of these readers are first-generation immigrants who, along with their children, may eventually read the Journal.

Herrera edits the Journal's two local pages in Fronteras. For those pages, English-language stories from the Journal are sent to Danilo Black for translation into Spanish.

The Journal had thought about developing its own Spanish-language publication over the years, but is now very happy with Fronteras' content, design, and cost, said Herrera. He did note that the Journal earns less in Fronteras ad revenue than it pays to buy and print the publication, but added that this could change as time goes on. Meanwhile, said Herrera, "It's a good product for the community."

Fronteras is also distributed by newspapers in California, Florida, Indiana, Kansas, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Texas.

Coming in early 2006, said Slagle, will be national advertising for Fronteras.