Analysing Manx Papers.

The reason that I have waited until now to look at Manx papers is because I wanted to look at all of the 3 papers from the same week and due to the bad weather here recently the papers have often been delayed making this a challenge, in my previous post about the Manx papers I used what images I could fine online which is something that really was a challenge and this shows me that there is a market for my idea of a paper similar to the 'i'. However I am now thinking it was a slightly better idea to wait because after analyzing the 5 local newspapers I now have a really strong idea about what a local newspaper is all about and it gives me chance to brain storm my ideas as I am analyzing these final 3 papers.

Isle of Man Courier.

December 7th 2012

As I have said before the 'Isle of Man Courier' is the free sheet that is published every Friday. This paper is usually delivered to most of the homes on the Island by a paper boy/girl and this is how they predict their cover figures for when they sell advertising. 

So the first thing that hits me when I look at this paper is the fact that it is advertising how The Interdependent running two important local stories one about a 14yr old boy gaining serious injuries after being hit by a car and another about a wall collapsing and killing a man who worked for the water bored. However the Courier is the free sheet so why would Johnston Press put that kind of news in here when they know they can charge 75p and people are going to pay it. Instead They chose to put Samantha Barks who is a Manx girl and has just finished filming Les Miserables, this brief article gives information about how she rose to fame and how she has had 'a number of high-profile musical theater roles' and this led her to be cast for this Eponine. 

The other covering article is about how the Mount Murray Hotel and Country Club have wanted a casino licence since they began to extend and upgrade their hotel in 2009. The Government are refusing to give out the licence until the work is finished and an operator for the licence has been chosen. 

However around half of this page is adverts, the little blue one is for 'The Independent' the grey one is for 'Waltons' and the bed sale is at 'Millichaps' and Alliance Leicester are offering a 2.60% fixed rate saving with any bond. I am already beginning to see where 'The Courier' is making its money. 

As I began to look on the inside of the paper the amount of adverts is crazy until you get up to page 15 in this paper over half of each pages is just adverts with a few articles dotted around, atleast two of the pages are full page adverts. 

As I worked my way through the paper I noticed that it had different sections such as Classifieds, Announcements, Buy & Sell, At Your Service and Isle of Man Property. This paper also has a 24 page pull out of 'Manx Choice, Taste of the season' This is 24 pages of 'Shoprite telling you all the fantastic food that they have in for Christmas. however it is quite funny how 'Shoprites' slogan is Manx to the Max and the first 2 pages of this pull out are about meats that they have bought in from the UK. 

There is a 4 page section about jobs, and these pages are mostly filled with advertisements for jobs although there is one article about 'My life in the work place' which is were once a week a worker from anywhere on the island is interviewed and asked what they like most about there job, what qualifications they need, what is the most difficult thing about your job and things like that. The jobs section is something that I have seen in most of the local papers that I have looked in and it is some thing that you would expect the local paper to supply for the community. 

This paper has two sections Motors' and Courier Motors'. The first section is reviews about thhe Jaguar XF Sportbrake, how it drives why it is worth £50'000 ect and when you turn over there is another half a page advertising the garages that are going to sell it. The second one is more advertising service garages and cars that people are selling as well as adverts for scrap yards. 

The final 3 sections of this paper are the Public Notices which is mostly the 'Department of Infrastructure, The Treasury, Dougals Borough Council, Ramsey Town Commissioners and a list of all the new companies within the last week.

There is a whole page for 'Meeting Place' which is a dating page were people advertise themselves and then wait for other people to read and call them. It fills up space in the paper I suppose. 

All of the local sport over the past week is put into 'The Courier' and this week it has taken 4 pages which is more than usual. It covers all the local hockey, table tennis, football, walking league, gymnastics, bowls and much more. However that is about all it contains and on the top of the sports page it advertises the 'Independent' and what they have to offer that the 'Courier' doesn't.