The Business Real Estate Weekly of Arizona, or BREW, has teamed up with Rose Law Group PC in order to bolster its reporting manpower and online presence.
By Kristena Hansen
Phoenix Business Journal
The proliferation of the Internet has unquestionably shaken the future of journalism as we know it today, especially for traditional print publications.
While industry leaders and college lecture halls around the world have been entrenched in discussions about what the new age of journalism will look like, one answer may be right here in Arizona with unique partnership between a well-established niche publication and a powerful Scottsdale law firm.
The Business Real Estate Weekly of Arizona, or BREW ? considered by local professionals to be one of the most valuable sources of local real estate news ? has teamed up with Rose Law Group PC in order to bolster its reporting manpower and online presence, among other things, for its nearly 1,000 paid subscribers statewide.
For the law firm, the greatest benefit and most noticeable outcome of the partnership will be unveiled this Friday when the weekly print publication moves forward under a new name: BREW by Rose Law Group.
Tim McGuire, a journalism professor at Arizona State University?s Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication, said the partnership may be the first of its kind, but is the beginning of an industry transformation he?s been expecting to unfold for quite some time.
?Fasten your seat belt now because we?re going to see more and more of this,? McGuire said.
Terms of the partnership
For the past 18 years, Terry McDonnell, the founder and president of BREW who is also a former real estate reporter for the Phoenix Business Journal, has been running a one-man show. He personally breaks the latest commercial transactional news in Arizona in his weekly newsletter ? and often does so ahead of other media outlets and many times before deals even close or become public record.
?There?s nothing sexy about it,? said McDonnell, who has been a local real estate reporter for roughly 25 years at other publications such as The Arizona Republic. ?It?s really meat and potatoes real estate information. But if you are in the business, it?s a tip sheet.?
Under terms of the new partnership, Rose Law, which specializes in real estate practices such as planning, zoning and land use, will grow McDonnell?s reporting staff for the first time by embedding its senior planner, Nick Labadie, as a part-time reporter.
The law firm?s clients will also get a $100 discount off of BREW?s annual $359 subscription cost, which provides access to both the print and digital newsletters.
?We will not make any money off of his subscribers or his advertisers, that?s Terry?s business and we?re leaving that intact and alone,? said Jordan Rose, attorney, owner and founder of Rose Law Group. ?My interest is to provide our clients a service, a specific service in a niche market and one that will hopefully help them make more money.?
The partnership is also a powerful marketing tool for the law firm.
In addition to the BREW name change, the agreement calls for some beefing up of BREW?s website in order to break stories as they happen rather than waiting for the weekly newsletter. Rose Law?s blog will have a new BREW section, as well, where they?ll simultaneously break news headlines and direct readers to the BREW website for the full story, which will still have a pay wall.
?When you deal with the Internet and you also still have a printed publication, it changes things, If you want to have a breaking story featured on the front page, you?re afraid that somebody else is going to have it when you publish once a week,? McDonnell said.
During his peak year in 2007, advertising and paid subscriptions contributed almost equally to his total gross revenue stream. Today, ad revenue has dropped to about 25 percent, and while his subscriber base has been growing. At the same time, unavoidable printing and postage costs associated with a print publication continue escalating, he said.
?When Jordan talked to me about website enhancement, it just struck a chord that we have to improve that,? McDonnell said.
Navigating conflicts of interest
When Rose first approached BREW, McDonnell said he was immediately concerned that such a partnership would jeopardize the credibility he has worked so hard to establish and maintain as a journalist.
?I, of course, was worried about any perceived conflicts of interest. To me, there?s very rarely a reason not to report a story,? he said.
After doing his own due diligence on Rose, McDonnell said they then began discussing, at length, all possible conflict-of-interest scenarios that may arise and how to avoid them.
Rose said her firm will give BREW first access to stories pertaining to its clients if the client consents, and otherwise serve as a resource for reporting overall.
However, she was adamant that they will never have any control or compromise BREW?s reporting or content.
McGuire at ASU said this is the beginning of a era for journalism, where media outlets will increasingly partner with non-media companies to stay in the game.
?They?re going to seek revenue support and brand support wherever they can find it. I?ve told my students to not be surprised if, in less than 20 years from now, they?re working for Amazon doing journalism,? McGuire said.
In some ways, the shift will be exciting for the struggling industry, providing some much-needed financial support and bolstering of resources, which are pretty bare-bones in many newsrooms today, he said.
The question McGuire poses is whether the publication?s content will still be considered real journalism.
?Our standards as journalists tend to be tougher than the audiences?,? McGuire said. ?However, at the same time, the audience will quickly figure out whether this publication is in the bag with this company.?
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