A recently-launched Sunday newspaper is to change its masthead in a bid to align it more closely with its sister daily title.
The Western Morning News on Sunday, which hit the streets last June, is to adopt the WMN’s traditional masthead from this weekend to coincide with a fresh marketing drive.
Other changes to the Local World-owned title include a new Best of the West luxury property guide and the start of a series entitled ‘Ones to Watch’ across the arts, sport, politics and business sectors.
The paper has this week launched a new television, radio and print advertising and marketing campaign to back up the changes.
The new Western Morning News on Sunday masthead as it appeared in a promotional story published last Sunday.
Editor Bill Martin said: “We have developed the Sunday with a clear target market in mind and the overwhelming response has been positive.
“Feedback has told us that the strength of the Western Morning News brand, and its inherent trust and heritage, is something our Sunday audience wants to be closer to.
“The WMN, while standing firm by the values it and is readers value most, is constantly evolving.
“We have some big plans for the title this year and this week marks our readers’ first opportunity to see the initial changes.”
No sales figures for the Sunday edition of the Morning News have so far been made public. According to its most recently-audited ABC figures, the daily title has a circulation of 26,699.
The Sunday edition retails at £1.50 compared to £1 for the Saturday paper and 60p for the Monday-Friday editions.
The old masthead which the WMN on Sunday had been using since its launch last June.
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Hallelujah! That original crazy decision to go with the WMN masthead smacked of a marketing dept. bright idea which failed to take into account the brand heritage they already held in their hands. Good luck Bill and team – a fine paper in the week can now really go places on a Sunday.
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The one with busty women is a complete mess in every way. Did a school team design it?
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Somewhere, under lock and key no doubt, there will be a proper analysis on exactly how much money has been frittered away on this folly. And one is forced to wonder what might have been the benefit of spending even a fraction of that figure on the already excellent titles DC Media has in its portfolio. More overall profit to please HQ, one imagines, but also support for those existing titles in the medium term. But, then again, we don’t see much medium term thinking around here these days.
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The Western Morning News is a very good paper. I rate its Saturday edition the best read of the week, full of arts, antiques, entertainment, property etc. It gives a real ‘feel’ of West Country life.
I hope the Sunday paper is also a great success. The industry certainly needs some uplifting news.
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The change makes sense. The Sunday paper is part of the daily ‘stable’ so it follows that both papers should have a recognizable identity. Good look to the team – I hope it succeeds.
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It baffles me why they didn’t just expand on the success of the Saturday edition by broadening it out to become a weekend read with added content – i.e. magazines, supplements etc, like a regional Sunday Times. Instead, we got a freakish mishmash of a thing which looked like it had been designed by some whizz on a Mac and the content of which had been selected by a committee of 15. It’s had about four iterations in seven months already to my mind and, inevitably, the notion of the Western Morning News on Sunday being anything other than a failed brand disappeared the day they put ‘local lass’ Cheryl Cole on a third of the front page with some spurious link to a TV guide.
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Amazing how some SW titles get all the attention and investment, while others are just quietly closed.
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Both papers are in the same stable so it makes sense that they should share the same masthead. The old MWN masthead is awful and in my view too modern and uninviting. The Western Morning News on Sunday line looks as if it’s an afterthought.
I’ve always said why change something if it’s not broke and for the sake of it? Content should always come first before design, that’s what sells papers – ask the Wolverhampton-based Express & Star. There’s plenty in the paper, the layout and content have only been slightly tweaked over the years – and after all the E&S is the biggest selling regional daily! Enough said.
Good look to the team.
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Bill & Mark’s Most Excellent Adventure II – The Sequel!!
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The Sunday edition has been dreadful with amateur, and probably unpaid, columnists producing drivel no one would want to read. A masthead change this early says a lot I suspect about the title failing to sell in the numbers anticipated. The daily WMN is a shadow of its former self too although I agree the Saturday edition still has what it takes. And that’s what the paper should be, a weekly.
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Most of the recent ‘innovations’ on the WMN on Sunday – social pictures, a Through the Keyhole feature and design tweaks to name but a few – have been shameless rip-offs from the excellent Devon Life magazine, staffed I note, by some familiar faces who bailed out from Local World a long time ago.
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Let’s hope they don’t rip up the 4 Xmas features currently on the home page of the Devon Life website. My personal favourite is Xmas gifts for animals. I’d suggest editorial team start working on the website before they get left even further behind.
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Let’s hope the WMN don’t rip off the four Christmas features currently on the Devon Life website prominently featured on home page. Out of date content will ensure users won’t return to your website. Start taking the online traffic seriously Arthur Sixpence, or you and those “familiar faces” might be out of jobs at Archant too.
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Great Scott Woody Cornwall, I think you’re travelling solo with those kind of angry thoughts. Calm down, dear.
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The relaunched WMN on Sunday was, indeed, packed with content (the least said about the design and the ‘flow’ of the paper the better – not sure if Bill M is actually editing it these days?) but isn’t this all just had a tad too late? The actual launch issue should have been like this – heaven knows they must have had long enough to plan and prepare for it. It’s too late – most WMN readers I know have tried the Sunday edition, found it wasn’t for them and stopped buying it. What a tragedy this great opportunity for a great paper wasn’t managed better.
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