TEEN BUYS SMALL NEWSPAPER

Hayden Taylor is 19-year-old. He just bought the Central Delta Argus-Sun, a very small-town newspaper which serves Arkansas’ Brinkley and Monroe counties. He plans to beef up the paper. Hayden attended college for a year, never chose a major, and took no journalism courses. He plans to buy a few textbooks and read up. He says he’s more concerned about management and administration, and how to make the bottom line work. The newspaper came with 1,800 subscribers. He plans to keep his focus local and highlight area sports and include shopping inserts for the grocery stores nearby. As for why he wanted to do this in the first place, he said, “My friends think Facebook is where they can get ‘local news,’ and I just don’t believe that. That ‘news’ isn’t always news, and it’s hardly ever really local.” When the paper does eventually get an online presence, Taylor believes he will put a paywall in place so that interaction is limited for people who aren’t subscribers.
* Hee hee … they’re so cute when they’re babies, aren’t they?
* Finally Hayden’s friends will be able to keep up with the fast-paced flood of earth-shattering local news events in Arkansas’ Brinkley and Monroe counties.
* He’s going to include shopping inserts for the grocery stores nearby? Wait ’til the Pulitzer Prize for Journalism committee hears about this!
* Tell you what, Hayden. After you make that first pile of money on your newspaper, I’ve got a radio station you can buy.
* (get close to the mic) Hayden, I’m not kidding. I really have got a radio station you can buy.
* Hayden, I’ve got two words of advice to help you sell advertising: Bait Shops.
* This would be a tremendous move…in around 1910.
* At least the name Argus-Sun makes sense.
* He took no journalism classes? Relax, kid. Knowledge is overrated anyway.
* Just go on your gut instinct the way you did when you decided to buy the paper. That always works.