South London Press

   South London press is not your typical British newspaper. If anything, it seems as though it has a more small town feel like our very own Hattiesburg American. With 11 nationwide newspapers in the UK, South London Press is one of the few local newspapers, covering only parts of South London. As a result of the small town vibe, the paper has stayed out of the controversy of the nationwide publications and the Murdoch scandal. The paper has even managed to not report on the topic because as Hannah Walker, the editor of the South London Press puts it, if it does not concern the community, then it should not go in the regional paper. The paper covers areas of family, schools, and generally anything that concerns the community.

  It is an independent production that has been around since 1865 and is currently owned by Tindle Newspapers. The paper comes out twice a week with an informative publication on Tuesday and an entertainment edition on Friday, just in time for the weekend. The press also puts out free editions including The Mercury and two different versions of The Post, which both deal with different areas.

   Despite the different publications, the staff at South London Press is relatively small and the majority of them work on all of the publications instead of focusing on a single paper. The staff also is extremely well-rounded. If you know how to write, you must also know how to design, and if you know how to design, you must know how to edit.

Everyone on the staff was extremely sociable and eager to answer any of the students questions.

   The size of the staff does not affect sales; however, with the majority of the publications reaching over 30 thousand readers and The Mercury at over 70 thousand.

   Though it seems with every other news organization we have been to is cutting back on print publications and amping up their websites and mobile applications, South London Press is making no efforts to do the same. Walker says they will never go completely online because as a local newspaper, they are up to somewhat different standards than other national, more up to date newspapers.

   The papers are incredibly involved in the community and show this by reaching out and creating organizations such as Our Heroes. In Our Heroes a member of the community is nominated for doing some particularly courageous every week. Furthermore, the press is making a strong effort to get young people more work opportunities so they will be more equipped at finding jobs.

   The press is aimed at making the community happy and giving them a voice. They always find a way to make a story localized so that the people in the community will see how it affects them.