The most recent issue of Reporter Newspapers marked two significant milestones.
As you can read in the printed pages and online here, the City of Sandy Springs is celebrating its 20th birthday. While many of the city’s intrepid founders, including newly reelected Mayor Rusty Paul, like to say that the push for independence from Fulton County began decades earlier, there is no question that Sandy Springs set the stage for the cityhood movement that has reshaped Metro Atlanta.
I wasn’t much older than 20 when I left Sandy Springs, a decade before Eva Cohn Galambos and crew would achieve their goal. Truth be told, I couldn’t wait to spread my wings and experience other places. I needed independence, too, and getting away from my childhood home was how I felt I would achieve it.
That’s what makes the second milestone so poignant, if not slightly ironic.
A crazy, lucky idea
Five years ago this month, I bought Reporter Newspapers and its portfolio of trailblazing local newspapers whose (declining) revenue came almost exclusively from print advertising. While the endeavor thrilled me, it was, admittedly, an odd time to do so. Media was being upended by technology, and some people were still spraying their mail with Lysol, let alone picking up printed newspapers.
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The gamble has worked out beyond my expectations. In addition to creating the perfect job for myself, we are closing 2025 with record revenue, and readership approaching one million people each month across print, web, newsletters, and social media.
I don’t take any of this growth or success for granted. As you have read here before, industry headwinds remain fierce, and macroeconomic uncertainty is a constant threat to advertising investment.
I know we are reaching more and more people every week. In fact, a young journalist recently told me that “Even my friends who don’t follow the news read Rough Draft,” and I blushed and beamed simultaneously, pride fighting its way through my imposter syndrome.
‘Even my friends who don’t follow the news read Rough Draft.’
People are reading Rough Draft in print, online, and via email because the work our team puts out day after day is some of the best in town. Not only do I hear it from other local journalists, but I see it in our readership numbers and in the feedback from neighbors who tell me that they rely on our publications to stay informed.
Our goal is to give you a mix of the news you need (local government, public safety) and the stories you crave (food, arts, real estate), and five years into this local media adventure, I’m really proud that we are hitting that mark.
Please keep your feedback coming via email (keith@roughdraft.news) or via our year-end survey (it will take you less than two minutes).
Coming home again
At a recent dinner to talk about the state of Black-Jewish relations in the wake of October 7 and George Floyd, I sat at a table where four people had grown up in Sandy Springs and fled as young adults, only to make their way “home” in the last five or six years. We shared similar stories, but all agreed that we were happy to be where we were.
Real talk, as the kids say: I never thought I’d be engaged again in the community, let alone own the newspaper that has given me a front-row seat from which I can proudly say, “yeah, I grew up in Sandy Springs. It’s pretty nice, isn’t it?”
Happy Holidays! Here’s to another 20 years of prosperity for the city and for local journalism.