‘How we operate as a free newspaper’

Today’s Impact, a weekly newspaper circulated to readers free of charge since May last year, was officially launched this past Thursday, July 28. The Chief Executive Officer and Editor-in-Chief of the newspaper, Mr Sebagen Henry Noboh, says free newspapers are feasible because newspapers do not survive on cover prices What informed the name Today’s Impact? […]

Today’s Impact, a weekly newspaper circulated to readers free of charge since May last year, was officially launched this past Thursday, July 28. The Chief Executive Officer and Editor-in-Chief of the newspaper, Mr Sebagen Henry Noboh, says free newspapers are feasible because newspapers do not survive on cover prices

What informed the name Today’s Impact?
We arrived at Today’s Impact after much thought along a desire for something uniquely our own. We wanted something different. We didn’t want to follow Nigeria’s existing newspapers which bear names of newspapers published in western countries. And we were determined from the beginning to make impact. We wanted a pace-setting publication.
In the first place, what motivated you to start the newspaper?
As a journalist who covered education for quite a while, I felt not much attention was being given to education by any of the newspapers. Newspapers have their biases for business, sports, politics and the like, but I knew of none with a bias for education. I wanted a newspaper to fill that gap. Also, in Nigeria, we didn’t have free newspapers. We started Today’s Impact with the mind of presenting quality information for people with no access to existing newspapers (which come with price tags). So, our bias is education, and if our lead story is not education, our second lead is typically education. And we are motivated to give reliable information to the public free of charge.
How did you get your passion for the education beat?
Education was central to me when I ran the education pages of the BluePrint newspapers. I pioneered the Education Desk of the BluePrint (an Abuja-based newspaper established in May 2011).
How does your free newspaper operate?
Today’s Impact has no price tag. We’ve been giving it out free to readers. You may not find it at the news-stands, mainly because vendors would not support it. We give it directly to readers. Where we must do it, we pay vendors to assist us in the campaign of getting the newspaper to people. But, mostly we do direct deliveries to offices and schools, especially tertiary institutions of learning.
Newspapers that readers buy barely survive these days. How do you sustain your free newspaper?
To what extent can copy sales sustain you as a newspaper, especially new ones still striving to create brand loyalty? To gain the required exposure and begin to make money from copy sales takes time and  a lot of work, and in the end, how much can sales sustain you even as an old newspaper? So, maybe I got the courage for the free newspaper from knowing that offering the newspaper for a price is not as compelling as one would readily think. It’s one thing to fix a price, it’s another for people to buy. Today’s Impact has a higher circulation rate than some newspapers that have been around for decades.
You have been publishing a little over one year now. How has the business been?
We started at a time (May 2015) when the economy was already dwindling. Getting newsprint, for example, is a tasking experience. But we are resolved to keep producing a free newspaper that is valuable to readers.
You are an Abuja-based newspaper. How farther from Abuja do you circulate?
Beyond Abuja, we get to Kaduna, Kano, Edo, Borno and Sokoto states. We aim soon after our official launching to widen our circulation to at least 20 states. We’re mostly in the North, but we want to reach down to the South, especially South-South and South-East.
The motto of your newspaper is ‘Without fear or Favour’. But is impartiality not the claim of every news publication?
We make a difference that shows. Many people have called us to ask, ‘Where do you stand? We are not seeing your leaning.’ We tell them that we are not pursuing any particular agenda.
What do you wish to say to your readers, especially in light of the July 28 formal launch of the newspaper?
We will remain true to our motto. We are here for readers who thirst for a newspaper without biases along ethnicity, regional, religious, and political lines. We will also remain committed to offering quality content free of charge. We don’t want people to be deprived of information because they have no money.