Morning News Changes Flag ? Again

The Morning News seems to be having an identity crisis.

In 2000, after paying out the proboscis for consultants to redesign the stodgy old Springdale-based newspaper, The Morning News began publishing four zoned editions.

The Page 1 flag was changed to prominently display the city in which the paper was circulated — Springdale, Fayetteville, Rogers or Bentonville. It looked like the name of the newspaper in Springdale, for example, was simply “Springdale.” The words “Morning News” were in typeface less than half that size to the right of the city name.

Each zoned edition contained pretty much the same stories, except the front page was changed to cater to the zoned city.

The move seemed to be saying, “Hey, we’re really four hometown newspapers instead of one big regional newspaper trying to compete head to head with the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette in Northwest Arkansas.”

But on Jan. 18, the newspaper went back to a flag that states “The Morning News” with the zoned city identified underneath in typeface half as large as the newspaper’s name.

We figure the 2000 redesign pretty much left area readers confused about what newspaper they were reading. We like the recent change much better. We just wish The Morning News would find its niche and stay there for a while.

Donrey Media Group, which is now Stephens Media Group of Little Rock, said it had produced a “regional newspaper” after merging its separate newspapers in Springdale and Rogers in the early 1990s to form what is now The Morning News.

With the most recent changes, the Sunday edition is the same for everybody in the four zoned areas except the “Our Town” section is still zoned for the separate cities. The editions of The Morning News that come out Monday through Saturday have the zoned city name on Page 1 and different front pages just as before.