In a case study of six independent community newspapers in South Africa by the Sol Plaatje Institute for Media Leadership at the School of Journalism and Media Studies at Rhodes University, the authors concluded that the values used to describe and define grassroots media "have shifted from resistance to reconstruction and development."

This study, entitled Key Editorial and Business Strategies: A Case Study of Six Independent Community Newspapers, reveals two important realities of South African society today. By empirically evaluating six successful privately-owned community newspapers, the study highlights both the positive impact that these papers have on the media industry in general, as well as their effect on the development of specific underserved populations throughout the country.

Such findings are especially topical in light of the recent surge of xenophobic violence in the country. An author of the study Peter Du Toit, explained in an interview with RAP 21 that "There are many [community papers] that are grappling with the challenge of bringing communities together and playing a role in bridging gaps between formerly divided communities." Here he describes the trend where, over the last two decades, community newspapers have turned to embrace a more proactive and participatory role in society.

Compared to the large newspapers, community papers can better navigate through the diverse topography and demography of the country in a more personal fashion. Each of the papers examined have a clearly defined community that they reflect, interact with, and inform. Du Toit emphasizes this, explaining "In South Africa community papers tend to serve localized communities and are consequently able to focus on the minutia of community life. I’ve not come across this often in other African countries and sense that this role is largely taken up by community-orientated radio stations."

For example, The KZN Community Newspaper distributes free sheets to Zulu speakers in and around Durban, Pinetown and Pietermaritzburg, increasing the visibility of citizens in the face of the government. Similarly, the Ikhwezi News found its audience in the often-voiceless people in the townships and rural areas of the Eastern Cape and KwaZulu Natal. Ikhwezi News has kept afloat through a business partnership with the local municipality. Furthermore, The North Coast Courier targets primarily middle class white people living in the affluent North Coast area by providing solely local news. Bruce and Rose Stephenson, the owners and managers of the paper explain: "We have a policy that anything outside of our distribution area doesn’t happen."

Community newspapers, an industry that started to grow at the end of the apartheid, are confronted with a broad range of obstacles that threaten their viability and often even undermine their significance. One such obstacle is the high level of diversity even within one community. Du Toit emphasizes this point saying, "Many community newspapers are trying hard to serve all sectors in their communities, but this is challenging in a very diverse society."

“I think there are many marginalized and poorer communities that do not have the benefit of a community paper and this is a great pity. Those papers that are serving economically marginalized communities face enormous financial hurdles to keep publishing,” said Du Toit. The study thus strives to illuminate the best strategies and practices used to combat the range of obstacles these papers face.

“My sense is that for most of these papers their financial future rests on conserving and further developing their connections with their communities. These relationships are the very factors that set them aside in the market and which give them their niche,” said Du Toit.

"They cannot and should not try to replicate the more mainstream titles. Rather they should explore ways of developing their community connections further and building on what they do best," he continued. In other words, community newspapers must maximize their reliability, relevance, and tangibility to fully fit the interests and needs of their readers.

Among the papers surveyed, all of them identified viable financial resources as going hand-in-hand with high quality editorial content and a strong community presence. You cannot have one without the other. Limited media professionals at the local news level, linked directly to the financial viability in the industry, have inhibited many of the newsrooms from securing a permanent professional staff. Consequently, in many of the newsrooms, tasks are shared as to compound skills and teach others, under the supervision of the manager.

“Skills are a major problem,” said Shirley Govender, manager and owner of the monthly free sheet Southern and Soweto Globe. In her newsroom, no one has formal training or previous print media experience. “I’ve learned now in the past couple of years, that if you want the right kind of skills you pay for it. If you can’t pay for it, you train it. If you want someone to work for a two year period, it’s worth the investment,” she said.

Another common option is to hire locally based freelance journalists. The Limpopo Mirror, Ikhwezi News and North Coast Courier each only have one permanent journalist employed-all other stories are written by journalists within the distribution area, further cementing the paper’s connection with the community.

However, the study found that training journalists or featuring strong correspondents in community newsrooms does not always lead to a permanent and qualified staff. “We often lose the good correspondents to bigger groups, which is a pity. We train them and get them up to a certain standard, and then they move on,” said Rose Stephenson, co-owner of The North Coast Courier.

Looking to the future for this media sector, the reputation of community newspapers as being either a stepping stone to a successful journalism career or as a feeble source of investment must be first fixed through the creative application of business strategies that do not fall short of serving the community.

The study found that the high incidence of failed local newspapers has resulted in scepticism-advertisers often see a great risk in investing in the community newspaper sector. "Many national advertisers want to see that a newspaper has been established for some time," said a representative for the Eastern Free State Issue in the study.

Larger commercial newspapers pose another set of problems to their smaller counterparts. The Eastern Free State Issue representative explained, "In many areas the big newspaper groups have the monopoly and they have the advantage of being able to market all their newspapers together and offer much larger discounts as well as package deals, which [small] independent newspapers can’t do."

Foremost, securing a solid advertising base was identified as one of the most important requisites for a sustainable future. “Numbers are determined by the advertisers...the advertisers are the people who can make the business grow or not grow,” said Anton van Zyl of the Limpopo Mirror.

The study suggested that creating an advertising strategy that works is a process that requires trial and error. Some newspapers initially thought offering lower rates than competitors would work, however in the long run it was realized that it only dented the market for the worse. Shirley Govender of the Southern and Soweto Globe saw that undercutting prices has the potential to destabilize the market and seriously compromise the financial strength of other publications.

Rather, Bruce Stephenson, co-owner of the North Coast Courier suggested that learning the price spectrum for different sectors of the economy was a more sustainable tactic: “You can’t charge the property guys because they’re used to paying low rates...You can charge higher for legals,” he said, giving an insiders tip.

In the long run, one possible way to improve the prospects in this arena would be to have local newspapers unite their efforts. Shirley Govender sees promise in a united front and also in the possibility of a lobbying group to advocate for government investment in local advertising. Establishing relationships with advertising agencies, such as the National Advertising Bureau (NAB) is also a smart way to break into the market, albeit sometimes difficult to secure.

Community newspapers have also bolstered their small publications by printing classified sections, including advertorials, setting up business services for their communities and outsourcing professional tasks to specialists in the community.

In terms of the sometimes precarious financial funds, Du Toit said on behalf of all the six newspapers included in the study that "Financially they were very conservative and avoided getting into debt as far as possible. For most of the owners we spoke to, this meant surviving some very lean years, but it also meant that when their publications did start turning profits they were on a sound financial footing."

A community newspaper is often born out of the motivation of one or several people, based in a room in one’s house, and funded out of one’s own pocket. Referring to the six newspapers included in the study, Du Toit said "All were willing to start small and to run their operations on a shoestring until they were stable."

To read the study by Claire Milne, Asta Rau, Peter Du Toit and Francis Mdlongwa please visit: http://www.spiml.co.za