Local news publishers and outlets face existential dangers.
There’s no money, a distinct lack of resources with single journalists covering multiple patches across specialities, and an increasing sense that financial incentives and dividends are trumping the important work of reporting news that matters to people.
Those working in our profession have faced these challenges for years.
For example, the latest round of job cuts and reorganisation at Reach plc, the overarching publisher that owns a significant portion of local news in the UK, has resulted in the creation of a ‘central team’ that will disseminate news to local outlets.
Read: Senior editorial staff and editors hit hard by Reach cutbacks (Press Gazette)
That means fewer journalists, more important local news glossed over, and a lingering feeling that events happening on our doorsteps just don’t matter, but it is this short-termism in pursuit of turnover that is contributing heavily to the decline of local news.
The result will be its permanent demise.
I’m keen not to turn this op-ed into a self-aggrandising promotional tool, but it is true that our small team at the Bedford Independent is made up of local people who work, live and play in the patch we report on.
Read: Our team
In short, we care. We care about local business. We care about its people. We care about our high street and our town centre. For other so-called local news outlets to damage them in order to chase profits is a crime I cannot forgive.
Local news advertising must not damage local people
It is undeniable that local newspapers need advertising revenue to survive, and reading an article on your phone, even with pop-ups, is annoying but acceptable.
But forgoing the patch you’re supposed to champion and hold to account, to generate income from a business that has proven time and again not to care about its impact on small and independent businesses, is entirely unforgivable.
There is a way to generate revenue whilst remaining local. Instead, many outlets that claim to be local are not bothering to connect with their communities, choosing easy wins instead.
Recently, I’ve noticed a flood of standalone articles in newspapers that claim to be “local”, advertising products from companies such as Temu, Amazon and Shein – all in the past single week – and I am here to ask the question:
Who is this serving?
While I’m not entirely sure who benefits from this, outside of the owners and shareholders of these companies, I can tell you who it isn’t serving.
It isn’t serving the thousands of people in Bedford who work long hours on their own independent businesses.
It isn’t serving those who lie awake at night hoping they’ll make payroll, and are swimming in debt in order to keep their hometown business afloat.
It isn’t serving those who employ local people, trying to keep a town centre alive that is struggling for all sorts of reasons.
To put it bluntly, “local” newspapers that post advertising features, (presented as news) from companies such as Amazon, arguably the largest reason local, independent businesses are collapsing, are betraying the audience they are there to serve.
It must come to an end.
“Local news must be demonstrably local”
Towards the back end of 2025, I read an interesting piece by Jonathan Heawood, the Director of the Public Interest News Foundation, who demonstrated perfectly why local news matters.
In amongst the furore of Reform UK banning a local newspaper from engaging with councillors in Nottinghamshire, Heawood outlined why local news is so important.
“Firstly, local news needs to be demonstrably local,” says Jonathan. “The more that reporters are visible in their communities, the more they will be trusted.
“This is partly about independent and effective media regulation, but also about building relationships with the audience and exploring co-creational models of local news, where members of the community are actively involved in producing journalism.”
While Heawood is right, it is also important to be honest about how local journalism is funded.
Like many independent publishers, the Bedford Independent runs national advertising through third-party networks, but we work closely with our provider to ensure the brands shown do not directly undermine local independent businesses or employment opportunities.
Crucially, our direct advertising is built on relationships. The vast majority of adverts you see on the Bedford Independent and in the Bedford Clanger come from local businesses that know us, trust us and are part of the same community we report on every day.
This balance allows us to recognise both the local employment opportunities offered by big business and the importance of local independents in our Borough’s economy.
That income then helps us to keep our news free and accessible, while also recognising the business diversity that makes up our community’s ecosystem.
Independent journalism cannot exist on good intentions alone, but it can exist with clear principles, transparency and a refusal to profit from the erosion of the very businesses that give a town its character.
A model of local news cannot involve only promoting products from a multi-billion dollar company like Amazon, whose pre-tax profits in the UK alone reportedly reached over £432m, up £27m on the previous year, according to CityAM.
Read: How much profit Amazon makes in the UK (City AM)
It is well understood that Amazon’s universal service has knocked local businesses for six. What are the benefits of only advertising cut-price webcams and electric razors for local people and local businesses?
There aren’t any.
Yet, these news outlets expect local people to continue reading their pages.
It has to stop. The two cannot co-exist.
If, as a publisher, you only support the very businesses that are actively destroying the local area you represent, leave reporting the important local news to those of us who do give a damn.
