Look For Changes In The Burlington Free Press

[Henry]

Went out and got the Free Press this morning only to find it was again really, really light.  It has 7 pages printed on both sides (There was a supplemental section also that neither of us usually read).  There was the following notice on the front page:

"We've made changes to the Free Press starting today that will provide a quicker and broader look at the news of the day.

We know the need for a good briefing every day. This includes local news as well as national and world news. We have begun a process to creatively adapt to challenging times while providing a compactly edited newspaper with in-depth news as merited.

We will present daily briefings throughout the newspaper on the front page, Page 2, Vermont, Busi-
ness, Sports and the cover of the Living sections. Our short-term goal is to increase the number of stories in the Free Press by as many as 50 stories a day.

This is an approach that many readers grew up with in the 1950s and 1960s, when newspapers went full bore in loading the news of the day into their pages. Readers of the Free Press Sports pages know this approach well as our sports staff has delivered a comprehensive report each day.

We also have been exper-, imenting with a two-section newspaper to provide more flexibility on how we present the news. There are days when there is need for more local or regional news or a need for more sports news. Our traditional sectioning has inhibited flexibility. We will present a two-section newspaper Monday to Wednesday, to improve our flexibility in responding to the news.

Later this week, two Living sections — My Weekend on Friday and Home on Saturday — will become compact tabloids similar to Business Monday and Weekend, which are easier to handle.

Today the changes begin. In this section, you will find the local and wire reports, the editorial pages and Sports. In Business Monday, you will find business news along with Living, puzzles and comics.

There will be more changes as we adapt and streamline and as we focus in-depth on the stories that you need and want to know. Our commitment remains to provide a good local report and a solid offering of national and world news.
— Mike Townsend, Executive Editor