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April 18, 2006

Dear AP Sounding Board members,

AP requested your feedback on BC-Under 35, a weekday advisory listing stories of interest to young adults.

In brief, does the advisory serve a useful purpose in your efforts to reach at-risk readers? Or is the advisory dispensable, as long as the content remains?

Our 40th survey received replies from 22 newspapers – the most of any Sounding Board query so far. A wide range of circulations and regions were represented in the responses.

In a nutshell, most regard BC-Under 35 as a handy backup for identifying and highlighting AP material of interest to the target group. Several don't use it at all. A few found the lines too diffuse, and a couple questioned the idea of aiming news at one group.

Opinions vary on whether the advisory is essential. One editor described it as a "must read" for his specialists dealing with the young adult demographics. Another called it "nice to have" but "wouldn't bother me if it went away." Others said it's fine to drop the advisory it but keep the content coming. One editor said AP's new premium service, asap, had proven more effective for reaching the U-35 readership.

There were several other suggestions on alternatives to this advisory. One editor proposed flagging the stories themselves as U-35 interest. Another editor would like the content listed on AP's main news digest under a subhead. "It would eliminate having to look in both places to make sure we aren't missing a story."

AP editors will be looking closely at your input before deciding on what, if any, changes to make.

The survey questions and your responses follow in order of receipt. As always, many thanks for participating.

Dave Minthorn

The questions:

1. Do editors at your newspaper regularly look at the Under 35 Advisory?

2. How effective do you find it as a way of helping you identify content you want to publish?

3. Would it matter to you significantly if AP were to drop the daily Under 35 advisory, while continuing to offer a mix of stories aimed at this demographic?

Responses:

Reed Eckhardt, managing editor, Wyoming Tribune-Eagle, Cheyenne, Wyo.:

1. Yes, it is part of our daily budgeting process and is included in the package of budgets that we use at our budget meeting.

2. I think it does a good job of identifying stories of interest to this target group. Certainly it calls attention to stories that might otherwise be missed among the daily AP report.

3. Certainly we would be able to function without it, but I think it serves an important role and should be retained, if only to remind all of us of the needs of this target group.

Bill Felber, executive editor, The Manhattan Mercury, Manhattan, Kan.:

1. Not nearly as much as we ought to.

2. It's a tool that I try to be aware of, but just one of several.

3. I'd prefer it be available, but can't say its absence would markedly change our approach.

Nan Seelman, national editor, The Detroit News:

1, Yes. We look at it daily.

2. Any alerts to stories that might appeal to younger people are welcome. We'd like to think we have some idea of what those stories are, too, but there always a chance we could miss one or benefit from others' perspectives.

3. It wouldn't matter significantly. Keep it.

Tim Kelley, managing editor, and Jason Adrians, nation and world editor, Wisconsin State Journal, Madison:

1. Yes, daily.

2. It a helpful advisory that pulls together items from several AP budgets and serves as a good reminder to consider the interests of the demographic.

3. As long as the stories are available, no. But again, it is a helpful compilation that highlights some of AP's more interesting, useful and offbeat offerings, from culture, technology and entertainment in particular.

Bill Rose, managing editor, The Palm Beach Post, Palm Beach, Fla.:

1. Editors at The Palm Beach Post don't regularly look at the Under 35 advisory.

2. I appreciate the attempt and the idea behind it, but those sorts of news decisions and play decisions really aren't helped much by lumping those budget lines onto an advisory.

3. We would not mind at all if AP dropped the advisory.

Wayne Stewart, managing editor, The Topeka Capital-Journal, Topeka, Kan.:

– The Under 35 advisory is helpful in pointing us to stories for that audience

Ken Tuck, managing editor, The Dothan (Ala.) Eagle:

1, Yes

2, We find it helpful. Some stories are kind of mundane, but they usually have something of interest. Being in a very conservative market I was originally concerned about some of the language used in some stories, but that hasn't been a problem.

3, I would be fine with it as long as the AP still offered stories for this demographic. Just don't bury it in the daily budgets.

M.L. Schultze, managing editor, The Repository, Canton, Ohio:

1, Yes

2, Helpful, but we are using ASAP more than the under 35. The style, as well as content, of ASAP seems a better fit for us.

3, Any signposts are good to have.

Dori Hjalmarson, wire editor, Lexington (Ky.) Herald-Leader:

1, Not that I know of. I don't.

2, Perhaps I don't understand the process for choosing or writing stories for that advisory. I don't find it effective for my purposes. Partly because I am under 35, I like to think I already have some grasp of my demographic's interests. Also, I find the categories kind of arbitrary. It's like ... if a story's about sex, drinking, gay people or teenagers, it makes the list, but I don't really think that's necessarily a good way to target my age group. I think writing style, not necessarily subject matter, drives my age group's reading habits.

3, No, it wouldn't bother me.

Dan Roherty, copy desk chief, The Post-Crescent, Appleton, Wis.

1, Not on a regular basis for the daily wire news desk. I can't speak for the Features or Sports departments.

2. My impression is that much of this is feature material that has a difficult time getting in the daily news report regardless of its demographic focus. In the future I would give it a closer look.

3. From a hard-news perspective it probably doesn't add much as long as we continue to look for interesting stories in general that appeal to younger audiences. Again, features and possibly sports may be using this to better advantage.

Ken Canfield, nation/world editor, Dayton (Ohio) Daily News:

We do look at the Under 35 Advisory and use it in preparing the daily wire budget.

Would we miss it if AP discontinued it? Well, we've noticed that stories on the advisory sometimes don't show up on AP's other daily budgets. However, we could live without the Under 35 Advisory if these stories were placed on another budget.

The Plain Dealer, Cleveland:

Mike Norman, entertainment editor:

I have never seen this. Didn't even know it existed, so I can't help with the survey. This may be an indication of my own cluelessness. But I am more inclined to believe what I know in my heart – AP is always late with Arts & Entertainment news and trend stories. Other wires, Reuters, etc. are better.

Laura DeMarco, pop culture editor:

I don't look at this advisory. It's pretty obvious (to me, at least) which content appeals to the under 35 crowd without AP having to list it.

Daryl Kannberg, assistant managing editor for news:

1. Yes, Kathie and I, and perhaps others, do look at it each day.

2. Once in a while, it will point out something I might have missed. But odds are I would have found it later while going deeper into the wires.

3. It's nice to have, but it wouldn't bother me if it went away. I look at it because it's there, not because I'm looking for it. I'm already viewing stories through that under-35 prism, so it hasn't benefited me a great deal.

Scott Angus, editor, The Janesville (Wis.) Gazette:

1, We don't use it much.

2, It's not terriby effective because the stories often seem more general-interest or so targeted that we don't have a place for them.

3, No. We wouldn't miss it much, though it would help if AP occasionally alerted us to particularly good stories aimed at the demographic.

Tina Marsh, assistant news editor, The Democrat and Chronicle, Rochester, N.Y.

After talking among news editors at The Democrat and Chronicle, the consensus was that we do look at the Under 35 budget regularly.

However we agreed that most often we have identified those stories as of interest to young readers from the daily newsdigests. We do have a suggestion: Rather than sending a separate budget, why not flag those stories as a normal course of compiling the news digest as "UNDER 35 INTEREST?"

Paul Brouilette, wire editor, The Tampa Tribune:

Editors here don't use the Under 35 Advisory regularly. They would not miss it if it were dropped, as long as the stories aimed at that group continue.

Bill Betterton, news editor, Arizona Daily Star, Tucson, Ariz.:

1, Yes we do

2, It gives us a different perspective on the stories, but I'm not sure how AP has determined that these stories will appeal to an under-35 crowd.

3, I think this could be included in the main digest with a subhead of some type because the stories are often repeated on both budgets. It would eliminate having to look at both places to make sure we aren't missing a story.

Chris Foran, assistant entertainment editor, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel:

1, We look at the Under 35 Advisory sparingly, focusing instead on the stories themselves as they land.

2, It's been of limited help – chiefly because we try to pick the best stories aiming at that demographic by reading them as they arrive.

3, It would not matter, so long as that mix of stories keeps coming.

Mark Bowden, editor, The Gazette, Cedar Rapids, Iowa:

The Under 35 Advisory is a must-read by editors at The Gazette who are involved in daily content planning meetings. In addition, it is a reference for two staff writers who are have similar beats. Before the front-page is framed in our evening news meeting, we take one final look at the Under 35 budget to make sure we're not overlooking the potential of content to reach young adult readers. We think the advisory is helpful.

David Ledford, The News Journal, Wilmington, Del.:

The Under 35 Advisory is read by both our news editor who handles the A section and local section, and by our features editors – including our health editor.

They appreciate the stories being broken out into a separate budget. But they tell me they go after stories aimed at that audience like heat-seeking missiles, and they would find this work even if it was not included on a separate budget.

So from The New Journal's point of view, the Under 35 advisory is helpful.

But if you drop it, we will still find the content because we put so much energy into reaching that audience.

Rick Everett, managing editor, The Star-Ledger, Newark, N.J.

Surveyed more than a dozen wire and news editors here and could not find anyone who regularly checks the under-35 advisory. While we want to have news that interests the under-35 set, I don't think we want to steer our news coverage to capture a certain age group.

David Birdwell, national/foreign news editor, The Seattle Times:

1. I can't find anybody who acknowledges looking at this budget regularly.

2. I think most of us rely on our instincts.

3. As the previous comments indicate, no problem at all.

Greg Johnson, features editor, Courier-Journal, Louisville, Ky.:

1. Editors do take note of the advisory.

2. Not especially effective.

3. That would be perfectly swell.

Dave Minthorn, manager, AP News Administration, coordinates the questions and answers. Newspaper editors wishing to suggest a topic can send an e-mail to Minthorn at dminthorn@ap.org.

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