Wowing Younger Readers

By: Rich Kane

Taylor Cleary and Alison Datko are going to save print newspapers.

That’s what they’ll tell you, with such an earnest zeal that you wonder if they’ve been living on some distant ink-stained planet for the last 20 years, where staff cuts and plunging revenues never existed.

Yet the ambitious young Orlando entrepreneurs—Cleary is 24, Datko is 25—insist they have a solution. They’ve launched their own syndicate, PowWow Press, which has two aims: to market up to 15 specialized columns geared toward millennials, and to produce The PowWow, a four-page weekly broadsheet insert they plan on shopping to newspapers, initially targeting publications in areas with large percentages of 18-35 year-olds.

“Young people have no reason to pick up a print product now and be excited by it,” Cleary said. “We’re bombarded online by clickbait and have developed a distaste for polarizing content. If we were to put together a group of writers that could provide relevant, strong-voiced content, we think younger readers would take notice.”

The pair’s idea was honed during their day jobs editing content at King Features Syndicate, where they fine-tune popular columns like Dear Abby.

“We know those columns engage traditional readers, but we think they miss the mark with young people,” Cleary said. “So we started chatting about what would engage young people.”

Some of their planned column topics include music, film, celebrities and politics. The centerpiece is a “reverse advice” feature, where readers supply answers to socially relevant talking points of the day.

“This is what will make young people pick it up,” said Cleary. “They have the opportunity to see their ideas and responses and those of their peers in a newspaper that thousands will read. It's something they can identify with.”

To give their venture a financial boost, they have launched a Kickstarter campaign with a goal of raising $15,000 to fund a free one-month trial period so newspaper managers can test The PowWow out. When that’s reached, they plan to make money off subscriptions and column sales.

Cleary said publishers will profit by “finally engaging the elusive younger demographic. Our content is created by and for those readers. Publishers will see the “vinyl record” effect: the newspaper’s status as an “old” relic will work in its favor. It will become popular not only as a source of intellectual conversation, but also as a “trendy pastime.”

Column pricing ranges from $3 to $7 per week depending on word count. Column bundles will be sold in varying monthly packages. Pricing for The PowWow insert depends on the circulation of each newspaper that picks it up.

“We’ve done a lot of research and gotten great response” Datko said. “We want to ask our readers, ‘What do you expect from journalism?’ We’re kind of going for the feel of HBO’s Vice—definitely less conservative than what’s in the newspaper now, but not necessarily left- or right-wing."

For more information, visit powwowpress.com