Page 189 - Comparing Political Communication Theories, Cases, and Challenge

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Local Political Communication

of Europe. In 2001, free dailies operated in fifty-two European cities,
altogether amounting to a daily circulation of 6.4 million copies and
rightly being heralded as the new “shooting stars” of local media (Vogel
2001, 576). The first free daily called Metro was published in Stockholm
in 1995; after a few months it ran a profit. Metro has since expanded
internationally and is serving, among others, the markets of Helsinki,
Basel, Bern, Lucerne, Rome, Barcelona, Madrid, Prague, and Budapest.
The format of these free media is news-clip oriented. Content is mostly
drawn from the big news agencies. Local angles are interspersed infre-
quently and without much research. The staff of papers such as Metro
writes little themselves, and editorials and commentary sections are gen-
erally missing, thus making the news operation slim and profitable. The
size of these free media is calculated to serve the average commuter on
his/herwaytoworkwithabouttwentyminutesreadingtime(Vogel2001,
583). Free papers such as Metro exhibit a professional layout and are easy
reading with a strong focus on light news and human-interest stories.
Their slim and flexible distribution systems rest on three pillars: One,
theyarebeingdeliveredtocommercialsites,rangingfromshoppingmalls
to small neighborhood businesses. Second, they are being delivered to
news boxes in high-frequency public spaces such as subway and train sta-
tions. Third, companies in some cities hire traditional “newspaper men”
who distribute the paper on behalf of the company on city squares, at
subway entrances or even to the doorsteps of apartment buildings. The
audience that free dailies cater to is young, time-constrained, and female,
and generally not invested with one of the established paid print media
in town. Female consumers frequently experience time constraints that
disrupt solid attachment to established news sources. Yet they are major
targets of advertising and the “twenty-minute” format makes them the
ideal type target audience of free dailies.
Paid media in several urban markets have decided to employ drastic
measures to fight off competition by free media. In Cologne, Germany,
the editorial board of the established Koelner Stadtanzeiger decided to
publish its own version of a free daily and successfully forced the free
media competitor out of the market – predictably shutting down its
own freeoperationafew weeks later. Others have put pressure onto the
distributive side by forcing local shop owners to either get rid of the
free paper or face a delivery stop of the established daily. How this new
competitive local print media market will ultimately affect paid media
is not clear. Potential scenarios point in opposite directions. In a more

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