Double Coverage Proves to Be a Waste of Times

The July 8 editions of the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette and the Northwest Arkansas Times showed that the “alliance” between those newspapers could use some fine-tuning.

Both papers made the Fayetteville Town Center their lead picture and story on Page 1. There was also a special section commemorating the new facility. If subscribers in the Times’ circulation area are going to receive both papers, why waste space by running the same story twice, much less as their lead stories? Each newspaper sent its own photographer and writer to cover the story.

Surely, the Democrat-Gazette could have found other articles worthy of Page 1 play to run and simply alerted readers to the Times’ article. Since the Times dubs itself as “Fayetteville’s hometown newspaper,” perhaps it should have handled the story.

What’s the point in an alliance between the papers if they’re not going to organize their coverage to benefit the readers?