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Daytona Beach newspaper gets a makeover

The Daytona Beach News-Journal has just undergone a major redesign, and the team behind it says the layout is cleaner, the paper is narrower, and the text is larger and easier to read. The design was chosen after the newspaper consulted with its editors and designers, as well as public focus groups.



Halifax Media owns the paper and its CEO, Michael Redding, said the new design helps it to lend itself better to its readers, the companies advertising with it, and the employees who put it together. The main architect of the redesign was presentation editor Keith Saunders.



Burke Noel, the newspaper’s sports editor, highlighted that the redesign makes the paper more portable and easier to navigate, while Saunders believes that it is better organized, more consistent from page-to-page, and has a cleaner look overall. According to Hilary Reilly, a News-Journal reader and member of one of the focus groups, the new design also will appeal to younger readers who might not have picked up the newspaper regularly in its previous format.



While the News-Journal is now one inch narrower, it still holds onto its use of the same 22 styles of type it has used in the past.



With newspapers having to compete with online media, they need to be constantly evolving and keeping their look fresh and modern, while still retaining the classic aspects that helped make them popular in the first place. To see how their ideas will look on paper, designers and editors will often work alongside printing companies and benefit from their professional advice.