"All staff:
I am announcing today that the Winnipeg Free Press will be combining its Saturday and Sunday editions to publish a substantially enhanced Weekend Edition for home delivery as of Saturday, October 31st.
At the same time, we are launching a new compact publication called On7 that will be offered in stores and boxes on Sundays starting on November 1st.
These are the most significant changes to our publication schedule that we have made in a quarter of a century. We have been considering these moves for some time and we wanted to make sure that we had all the details taken care of before making a formal announcemenmt.
I will be holding Town Hall meetings tonight (Thursday) and tomorrow (Friday) to discuss thse moves and answer any questions from staff.
The past year has been a difficult one at the newspaper. We have seen what is almost certainly the biggest year-over-year drop in revenues that the Free Press has experienced in modern times.
We have made cuts, but we also realized that we could not keep cutting and maintain the quality of the Winnipeg Free Press, which our readers demand.
Rather than simply withdrawing from the market one day a week and ceding ground to the Sun, we decided on a path that aggressively builds a new model for the Free Press by publishing a compact version for single copy sales.
We're showing our confidence in the future of the Free Press --and newspapers in general -- by saying yes, we can change. We can offer an exciting new paper while at the same time protecting the quality of our 137-year-old broadsheet.
We sometimes forget just how much and how often newspapers have changed.
Many of you worked at the Free Press when it was an afternoon newspaper. That's what it was when I first joined it as a young reporter in 1984. It then became a morning paper to serve readers whose evening habits changed to include supper hour news programs.
The Free Press also published only 6 days a week-putting out a Free Press Weekend edition for delivery on Saturday until February of 1985 when we started publishing on Sundays.
We're going back to a Weekend Edition that includes features that readers have enjoyed in our Sunday edition- a Homes section, extra puzzles, a books section, Faith pages, horoscopes for two days and a longer section of features and analyses that we're calling FYI- Feed Your Intellect.
On7 will have news, certainly, but will focused on the lighter side of the world with comprehensive coverage 0f sports and previews of Sunday games, and some fun entertainment.
Other newspapers are facing the same - or worse- problems as the Free Press. Some have stopped publishing entirely on Sundays or Mondays.
We have chosen a different path - a made-in-Winnipeg approach to strengthening and protecting the newspaper.
We think this is an innovative way to deal with the challenges we face- and a fitting one for a newspaper known for its long history, top quality and willingness to try new things.
The Free Press has long held the title of being the most-read big city newspaper in Canada - two out of every three Winnipeg adults read the paper at least once a week.
The Free Press was recognized this year by ther Canadian Journalism Foundation with its Excellence in Journalism Award, the first time a Western Canadian newspaper has ever won this honour.
We intend to qualify for this award again in the future, keeping our readers and exceeding their expectations to have a great newspaper.
Bob"
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Our thanks to NDP leadership hopeful Steve Ashton for participating in an extended 70 minute interview yesterday. Listener reaction was immediate, strong and not very favorable, but Ashton truly believes in his positions and philosophies, and endured what he agreed was the toughest grilling of the campaign with a feisty and good-humoured performance.
Win, lose or draw this weekend in his bid to replace Gary Doer as Premier of Manitoba, Ashton has committed to returning to the Kick-FM studios again in the future, saying that being accessible all media, and not just the big dogs of the mainstream, are an important part of politicians being accountable to the public.
Today at 4 PM, a special Today in History with CTV's Kelly Dehn; a preview of the NDP Leadership Convention with Free Press political columnist Dan Lett; and at 5.20, an email about booze problems at Bomber games, and news of a contest to win the new Slam!Wrestling book "Shocking Stories from the Squared Circle" with Jon Waldman.
