We're expanding the BusinessGreen Intelligence service and providing new ways for readers to access our award-winning coverage of the burgeoning green economy
Ever since its emergence in the wake of the invention of the printing press, journalism has been defined by a constant tension between reach and revenue.
If you accept the press has a critical - if vaguely defined and easily hijacked - constitutional role in any free society, serving as both a distributor of information and a check on powerful institutions, then it is crucial that accurate and balanced journalism can reach as many people as possible. The 'Fourth Estate' may frequently fall far short of its lofty ideals, but it only takes a glance at those societies where the press is actively suppressed and controlled by government to understand its importance.
The easiest way to reach a wide audience is to give journalism away for free, but that quickly runs into the question of how to fund the professional reporters and underlying infrastructure that makes it possible to provide content that is reliable, relevant, and engaging.
Multiple models have been tried to resolve this central dilemma, each with their own pros and cons. State funding, wealthy benefactors, advertising revenues, and modest cover prices (for decades a daily newspaper containing tens of thousands of words would famously cost less than a cup of coffee) have all served to sustain journalism, while fuelling perennial questions about editorial independence and vested interests.
But in recent decades the advent of the internet, the emergence of social media, and the accompanying demolition of traditional advertising revenue streams has imposed intense pressure on these established media business models. All across the world, local newspapers have gone to the wall at a shocking rate, while the number of journalism jobs has contracted sharply. The Fourth Estate has been left in a sorry state. Its reach may have exploded as content has moved online, but journalists have found themselves striving to maintain basic standards while seeing resources eroded and pressure to generate revenues intensified.
For a specialist title like BusinessGreen, the tension between reach and revenue is particularly acute. We joke in the office that we report on the economy and the environment, which means we write about everything. That means we want to reach as wide an audience as possible, especially when you consider the existential importance of environmental issues and the under-reported nature of the era-defining changes underway in the green economy. As the New York Times columnist Ezra Klein observed recently, "the biggest story in the world is the success of green energy", and yet that story is routinely overlooked and underplayed. BusinessGreen's mission is to support the green economy and help ensure that story gets the prominence it deserves. To do that we need to reach an audience that is large and influential, both expert and expanding.
But to deliver on that mission we require a revenue model that can underpin investment in the journalism that can enable such a reach.
Over the past decade and during a period of considerable flux across the media ecosystem we've proven pretty effective at developing such a model. A mix of premium pay-walled content for BusinessGreen members, advertising and marketing services for companies providing green products and services, the UK's most prestigious green business awards, and a series of online and physical events has added up to a viable proposition in a highly competitive market.
But a growing number of specialist titles have pioneered what could prove to be a better way of marrying the desire for reach and impact with the reliable revenues high quality content should be able to generate. It also promises to deliver an improved offering to all our existing BusinessGreen members.
As a result from today we are switching to a metered paywall and expanding our premium BusinessGreen Intelligence service to provide a wider range of in-depth analysis and opinion on the fast-evolving green economy.
This means anyone signing up to our free BusinessGreen Lite membership tier can access up to three articles a month of any type, allowing them to sample our reporting on some of the most important trends shaping the global economy.
For those who want to keep up to date on the latest developments across the green economy, a new BusinessGreen News membership will provide access to all our daily news reporting and accompanying email newsletter.
And our service for BusinessGreen Intelligence members will be expanded to take in all our analysis, features, and opinion, as well as our deep dive reports, quarterly whitepapers, curated Overnight Briefing newsletter, fortnightly interactive Editor's Briefings, and annual networking reception. The site has also undergone a modest redesign to highlight the wide array of in-depth content now available to BusinessGreen Intelligence members.
These paid for membership tiers will be available at a price that remains less than the cost of a cup of coffee a day, with further discounts available for those taking out a corporate subscription for their organisation.
The hope is this new approach will retain an element of BusinessGreen's free to air origins and ensure our reporting on some of the most important issues in the world can reach as wide an audience as possible, while allowing us to offer a significantly improved service to those members who will be able to access our content on a daily basis. It will also complement our growing programme of events and marketing services, all of which are designed to advance the cause of the green economy and help deliver on the goal of building a net zero and nature positive economy that is healthier, secure, and more prosperous for all.
BusinessGreen is changing, but our mission and the journalism that enables it remains the same.
