By Andrew Macdonald
As the SaltWire Network moves through creditor’s protection in the Nova Scotia Supreme Court Bankruptcy and Insolvency branch, a key question is whether a buyer would continue to operate six weekly newspapers.
A buyer might want just the flagship papers, The Halifax Herald, Cape Breton Post, and The Guardian in Charlottetown.
There are currently two competing deals swirling around SaltWire according to impeccable sources: Postmedia and Ron Stern’s Winnipeg Free Press.
If PostMedia emerges as the new owner, the weeklies may continue to operate.
Looking at its acquisition of the three former Irving newspapers in New Brunswick, a deal done two years ago, Postmedia only closed down an unprofitable weekly, but today continues to print other community newspapers.
There are six weekly papers under the SaltWire umbrella, The Annapolis Valley Register, The PEI Journal-Pioneer, The New Glasgow News, Tri-Couny Vanguard, Truro News, and The Valley Journal Register.
If the weekly papers continue, there could be a case for Postmedia to use them to distribute lucrative retail store flyers.
There has been some talk and suggestion The Antigonish Casket could be re-started by Postmedia, while others speculate Postmedia will end up selling the newspaper for $1.
The Casket was founded before Confederation in 1867, and had a long successful reach into the community.
Watching The Casket file closely is Nicole Fawcett, who bought The Port Hawkesbury Reporter from its owner, Advocate Publishing, where Sean Murray is CEO of the multi-generational printing business in Pictou.
Cape Breton native Nicole Fawcett has emerged as the new owner and publisher of the Pictou Advocate, a deal cemented in March 2024. A year ago she bought The Strait Area Reporter newsweekly. (Contributed).
In March, Fawcett also bought the Pictou Advocate from Murray, so she has a vested interest in what happens in Antigonish, which is sandwiched between Pictou and Port Hawkesbury.
SaltWire pulled the plug on The Casket in 2020, and it is no longer listed among its active six papers.
I caught up to Fawcett to discuss the Antigonish news market, which without a dedicated paper of its own means a news desert exists there.
But, Fawcett says there is Antigonish news in her Pictou Advocate and Port Hawkesbury Reporter. Both papers have two news staffers.
Fawcett started working at the Advocate in 1996.
Buying the Pictou paper “makes sense” says Fawcett. “Geographically we now cover from the CBRM border to Victoria County, all the way straight through to Truro. The Strait Area Reporter covers Antigonish, Guysborough, Richmond and Inverness counties and Victoria, and it just made sense to go into Pictou.”
She says because she used to work in Pictou, she is familiar with its weekly and feels connected to the communities served by the Pictou paper.
“It was actually the first paper that I worked on in 1996.”
Since Fawcett took over the Port Hawkesbury Reporter where her office is located, “subscription rates are up. We are very pleased. And they are up in both directions with the addition of Victoria County and we have been making some good headway into Antigonish, as well,” Fawcett tells The Macdonald Notebook.
The Reporter’s editor-in-chief lives in Antigonish.
“Before we did not have a strong presence in Antigonish, we are quite pleased with the presence we have there now. We are definitely covering the area well.”
She does not know if she might bid on buying The Casket. “I do not know if that is a possibility, I do not know what their plans are, but we cover the area well, and we will continue to cover it and we will probably be a little more in-depth, but at this point in time what is there really to buy at The Casket — just the name.
“The personal side of me is that The Casket has been there for so long. It was a fabulous paper up until a few years ago, and it represented huge strong community connections, and makes me sad that something that was so viable and wonderful is not in that position anymore,” she says.
“Beyond the name, there is no subscription base, there is no staff, there are no real assets that would go along with it, aside from the fabulous history.”
Fawcett says it is early days on whether she’d buy The Casket name. “I think we have potential to really grow there, and it makes sense with the papers on either side already covered it.”
With weeklies in Pictou and Port Hawkesbury being delivered into Antigonish now, “we will ensure it won’t become a news desert. In one way or another,we will be there to be part of the community.”
