Hans Nijenhuis, Editor–in–chief nrc.next, believes that a paid for newspaper aimed at a young audience gives a sense of quality and can thrive in a tough market of free newspapers. He also believes that sister papers can work hand-in-hand to provide newspaper products to completely different markets. It looks like he’s right. He talked to editorsweblog to give us his views on the reasons behind the success of nrc.next including the pricing and a shared newsroom.

Nrc.next (circ 70,000) was launched early 2006 as a sister paper to NRC Handelsblad (circ 270,000), a big, quality, evening, broadsheet newspaper in the Netherlands.

With NRC Handelsblad having an aging readership, the publisher wanted to look at attracting a younger audience but realized that a ‘one size fits all’ approach would not work. A new product, under the same brand was launched targeted to well-educated, non-readers under 35years. Welcome Nrc.next.

It is a morning tabloid in the form of a newsmagazine, rather than a newspaper, trying to ‘be a guide through news and personal life, bringing background stories to the news, personal finance, career and lifestyle’. The questions that it aims to answer on a daily basis are ‘what do you really need to know? What can you afford not to miss?’. It is sold at †1 and the majority of readers opt for a home subscription service.

In your presentation at the 9th World Editor and Marketeer conference in Madrid, you said that 60% of content comes from NRC Handelsblad’s 180 editorial staff and the rest from the 24 journalists at Nrc.next. What content do you take and what do you produce solely for nrc.next?
“It's better to say that 60 % of the content we share with NRC Handelsblad: they also take content from us. Sport stories for example appear most of the time first in the morning paper nrc.next. The rest is produced exclusively for nrc.next, by the 24 new journalists, AND the 180 staff of NRC Handelsblad AND freelancers. For example, this week a staffer of NRC Handelsblad produced an article about a new fitness machine, for nrc.next. Why her? Because she happens to know a lot about these type of machines and we asked her.
Most articles on the mainstream news issues (politics, foreign affairs, economics etc) we share with NRC Handelsblad. But if these subjects are coverstories (we have one leading cover story everyday), we often ask editors of NRC Handelsblad to write them especially for us. Why? Sometimes our focus is different. Example: after the proclamation of the death penalty against Saddam Hussein we asked for a story about the death penalty and the legitimacy of the trial (‘Are we suddenly in favor of the death penalty now that Saddam gets it?’), not about Iraq.”

Most of the papers for young people have short articles but yours are a mix in length. Which subjects do you write your in-depth articles on and what is your long-term plan?
“All subjects. Often subjects that are in the news. The difference is selection and focus. We start with questions: what do we want to know? For example: the cover story on Friday 15 December (the day of the European Council in Brussels) was: ‘Some of the most prominent members of the European Council (Chirac, Blair) will leave office soon. Will that make a difference?’”

What time is the editorial deadline? Welt Kompakt in Germany thinks its important to go to press as late as possible to get maximum news. Do you share that view?
“Yes. Although our paper is focused on analysis ('what the news means') we bring a selection of news to start with. Our deadline is 11.15 pm Sunday-Tuesday and 10.45 pm Wednesday and Thursday. That is early. This week it was too early. There was a political crisis in the country and the prime minister came up with his final press conference at midnight. Why are we printed so early? We share printing presses with other (older) newspapers that are (still) bigger than us. So we have to go first.”

How is the cost of your shared resources split? Does this have any impact on the sourcing, timing and publishing of stories? Does it mean that you have to wait for NRC Handelsblad to run a story before you do?
“Believe it or not: the costs of shared resources are not really split. We are 100 percent part of NRC Handelsblad BV and we are all on the same pay-list, we use the same computers etc. We are considered the morning-edition of NRC Handelsblad. Yes, we have our own budget for travel costs and freelancers etc, but so has the Friday and Saturday supplements of NRC Handelsblad. There is only one extra rule, and that rule considers freelancers if their story is published in both papers. The paper where the story is first published (that is the paper that asked for the story) pays the fee. The other paper pays the freelancer 10 percent of that fee, for the second publication of his story.”

What do you see as the main differences between your newsroom and a traditional one-paper newsroom? What are the main advantages/disadvantages of these differences?
“We work to more than one deadline. Also, the production of nrc.next is much more centralised. It is more like a magazine: we take into account all the pages together and is perfectly possible that Home has to skip an interview because International already has one. Rhythm and Images are important.

The disadvantage is that journalist sometimes have to work very, very long days. The advantage is that a small new paper like ours, has foreign correspondents, a science desk etc. The advantage is that you get a better product, but is probably only works well if you have a small staff.”

How has the newsroom reacted to it? Are the journalists happy for the content to be rewritten and used in another paper?
“Very good. They were happy that something was happening, instead of just laying off journalists as happens elsewhere. Before nrc.next started there was also scepticism: will anybody buy this new newspaper? Will it spoil our brand name NRC by being too populistic and simplistic? Now that nrc.next exists these fears have disappeared. They are happy to see their stories printed twice (and in color, in different format and often presented more lively.) If we rewrite, we always try to do that with the author’s knowledge.
What they are not happy about, and rightly so, are the sometimes longer working hours.”

Why do you think younger readers are happy to pay for the paper when they have access to a lot of the ‘news’ for free? Is there a danger of your website success eating into your print circulation?
“Because we give added value. News is for free, analysis, background, and all kind of great stories that you cannot find elswere are not.

nrc.next is a nice product with 'status.' It has 'quality'. When a newspaper is free, it is for everybody. ‘I am not everybody, I am special, so I read nrc.next.'. Compare it to the iPod, that is much more expensive than any other mp3-player, but still much more in vogue. As far as the website is concerned, at this moment there is only a general NRC website, which has a different look and feel. The nrcnext.nl starts next year. We hope to reach a new audience with that.”

In other countries, paid for papers targeting the younger audience are usually around 50-70c. How did you decide on pricing and what is your long term plan?
“Papers in the Netherlands are more expensive than elsewhere I am afraid. nrc.next costs 1 euro. That is about 66 percent of the price of other papers. We wanted it to make it within reach of students, but not too cheap: price is important for status. As we say: it is 'gratis or status.'”

Source: Hans Nijenhuis, editor-in-chief nrc.next