Reinventing the San Francisco Examiner

REDESIGN: REINVENTING THE SAN FRANCISCO EXAMINER

Not your everyday redesign An historic big-city title that everyone agreed had “seen better days.” A challenging three-month timetable. In a major urban market, a newsroom staff of only about 40.

And oh yes, did we mention the conversion to tabloid? Design consultant Ron Reason explains the wild and wacky reinvention of the former “monarch of the dailies.”

By Ron Reason Vice President/Creative Director, Garcia Media

Shortly before the launch of Garcia Media’s redesign of The Wall Street Journal this spring, I got a call from Bob Gower, design director at the San Francisco Examiner. “We’re thinking about redesigning. And by the way, we may convert to tabloid. Would you be at all interested...?”

Well, SURE! I’d had a great deal of fun working a few years back on the Boston Herald, a paper Bob’s editors said they admired a lot. I thought it might be great to get my hands on another big-city U.S. tab with an open mind and adventurous spirit.

As we learned more about the project, this turned out to be the case. Discussions and preliminary sketch sessions with the boss (Mario Garcia) got us all excited.

Only a few hitches: The paper wanted done what we normally prefer six to eight months to do.

And we were pretty busy wrapping up a particular Dow Jones publication. And the staff was pretty strapped and might not be able to provide the in-house support we were used to.

No matter. Where there’s a will, there’s a way, and three months later the “new” Examiner was born. Here is a glimpse into the process, and results.

RON REASON can be reached at ron@ garcia-media.com.

Examiner designs shown here, and many others, are available along with a case study at garcia-media.com/examiner.html or plan to attend Ron’s session at the SND conference in Savannah, “Absolutely TABulous!” See speakers’ schedule on page 32.

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BEFORE THE REDESIGN: The Examiner was a broadsheet that had some spirited content, but whose presentation was at times anything but. A front page just before the revamping of the paper shows essentially one story above the fold (the impact of the “centerpiece” story with the main photo is vague due to a three-word label head) – not so great for rack presence. The sports section, called “The Edge,” was typical broadsheet fare – a column down the left side, a main photo and headline – a fairly dull daily routine. Even with limited staffing, the editors felt they could do better for one of the country’s bigger metro sports markets.

THE NAMEPLATE:

IT’S ALL (OR AT LEAST PARTLY) ABOUT THE CONTENT: The Examiner has long had a history of covering the more “colorful” side of San Francisco news, as seen in this pre-redesign clipping. This spirit was taken into account in creating the new format and feel of the paper.

The usual research into the archives dug up these nameplate variations that had been used through the decades. A decision lay before the Fang family, who acquired the paper from Hearst in 2000: To keep the gothic lettering, or go in a bold new direction? Though more modern approaches were shown in a number of prototypes, the classic look was kept – but not much more of the old visual identity. For more, turn the page.

A radically new front page - a menu of news As soon as the decision was made to “go tabloid,” the editors asked for a design that would allow a high item count and a dramatically increased presence in street racks and stores. They didn’t hesitate to consider non-traditional story presentation – i.e., an all-promo front page – and felt that no one would miss jumping stories from the front page. The ingredients: bold images, daring headlines, a lively mix of urgency and fun, and a broad definition of what’s “news.” A great column has as much chance of getting teased out front as a big story about crime or celeb news. Staffer Tom Borromeo was recruited from his role doing editorial cartoons and laying out op-ed pages to become design editor of Page One. Planning and communication were dramatically transformed to allow brainstorming much earlier in the day, and front-page elements are edited heavily up until deadline.

(These are all “real,” post-redesign, staff-produced pages).

Photo illustrations can sometimes be used, as in this case, a Page One package that actually teased to a prominent feature in that day’s food section.

Mug shots as lead art? Why not? The Examiner doesn’t hesitate when it’s a compelling story, in this case an important local story from City Hall.

On Fridays, The Examiner doesn’t hesitate to play up its weekend entertainment and culture coverage. A splashy gold box points readers to what’s going on.

GREATER RACK PRESENCE: Where once the Examiner may have had two stories visible in the racks, now it has from 8 to 11 elements in display type (22 point or larger). And the back page, Sports, is sometimes shown in an adjacent racks, doubling the paper’s appeal to sports fans.

Mug shots as lead art? Why not? In this case, a local TV personality got herself in hot water and made headlines in classic tabloid style.

The lead head as a question, a blackand-white photo (of a colorful S.F. scene, the Golden Gate Bridge) and an ominous black border with reversed type combine for an impactful front.

Though the Examiner is locally focused, an urgent story from abroad, and a great AP photo, are also candidates for the front page.

At times, a mug shot can be reduced and combined with numbers. In this case, the story is less about the person than it is about the outrageous salary she takes home from a local nonprofit. www.snd.org

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Components of the new front page 1

The new Examiner debuted on Thursday, May 16. With excited consultants looking over their shoulder for last minute training and coaching, the staff hit the ground running and produced this lively front page. The end result looks more polished and mature than one might expect of a staff racing under a tight deadline to complete the new styles, formatting and training. It also lives up to several values as determined by the editors and publishers: to be intensely local, and to reflect the diversity of the community.

Here’s a review of the key visual ingredients as they are thrown into the mix each day:

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1. Promos in this corner each day tease to the paper’s best commentary. The front page editors have a choice of singling out one column, or going with three.

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2. The “Red Line” promo is an item of urgency every day. In this case, the local story of a hero cop delivering and saving the life of a new baby was a perfect fit for this style.

3. The centerpiece each day usually receives straightforward treatment. In this case, the headline was knocked out of the photo, almost giving the feel of a news magazine to this local investigative story.

4. The “routine” promo style was improvised on the fly, combining two-for-one on a review of the new Star Wars movie, and a news story from a convention of movie geeks.

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5. The urgent news promo (in purple) delivers the most hardhitting promos of the day, often local cops news or international conflict.

6. The peach background, red label, and italic type signal to the reader that this is the Q&A promo – this design is reserved for teasing the paper’s regular Q&A interview with a local personality inside.

(This feature was moved off the front page in the redesign.)

7. This special style was created on the fly, is not in the stylebook and was used only for the debut edition – to send readers inside the paper to a brief story of the birth of the new format and design.

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REMARKED AN EXCITED FAN WHO EMAILED US AFTER SEEING THE NEW PAPER ON ITS BIRTHDAY: “THE OLD EXAMINER, IN ITS HEYDAY, WAS THE KIND OF PAPER THAT GOT UP FROM THE RACK AND CHASED YOU DOWN THE STREET. MAYBE THIS REBIRTH AS A TAB WILL BRING THAT SPIRIT ...”

It’s the spirit of the thing Executive Editor Zoran Basich made it clear early on that he wasn’t interested in just changing the shape of the newspaper, or the fonts or colors, but that we should look for opportunities to improve the paper’s “spirit” and allow it to connect with readers in more powerful ways through better packaging. The page below was remade in the prototype stage, and the thinking process used in training, to show how planning, teamwork, and creativity come into play to create packages that break out of the routine.

BEFORE THE REDESIGN: The Examiner’s front page was pretty much “by the book.” Five stories were a pretty reliable recipe, and many decisions were made late in the day, often too late to consider packaging in creative ways.

The redesign attempted to turn aspects of the paper’s planning on its ear, bringing key players into the presentation much earlier in the day to brainstorm alternative ways of telling stories. The prototype makeover at right is one element that was used in coaching and training.

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GOOD LOCAL STORIES, WEAK PRESENTATION: The centerpiece on this page, about kids and violence in the Mission District of San Francisco, suffers from “assembly line” production and planning. A photo shows social workers quoted in the story – not actually kids affected by violence in the Mission, as one might expect – and a routine headline belies the drama contained in the text. A quick read of the first half of the story provided some ideas for a different presentation, described on the next page…

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2 PROTOTYPE 1: The above page shows the

day’s news at left in tabloid format, with new typography and some new promo elements, but essentially did not treat the centerpiece story in a substantially new way. The tighter focus of the smaller front page made it apparent that weak images, and assembly-line approach to the front, would make the paper’s weaknesses stand out far more dramatically. A second variation (at right) shows more impact and points to the new approach to planning that would be required.

PROTOTYPE 2: A second variation of the remade page showed the potential impact of the tabloid format. A quick read of the centerpiece story, on 3 kids and violence in the Mission District, revealed some dramatic numbers that should have been played up to command the reader’s attention, and compensate for the fact that the lead photo didn’t have the same drama of the text (hey, it happens sometimes). The lessons: Develop “story structures” that everyone on staff can learn and use. Get designers involved with reporters earlier. Commit to grabbing the reader in different ways.

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A magazinestyle home for features One of the great strengths of tabloids is the potential to display features news in a handy, magazine-like way. The Examiner exploited that by pursuing covers with impact, and reorganizing content to make better use of the tabloid texture and pace.

The result?

Sections that often surprise the reader and offer relief in the “middle of the book.”

1 FEATURES, BEFORE: While the mix of

stories on the Examiner’s broadsheet feature fronts may have been lively, the display often was not. “Ex Files” refers not to the defunct TV program but rather, a coy play on the paper’s abbreviated title.

FEATURES, FINAL PROTOTYPE: Late in the game, Executive Editor Zoran Basich decided to 3 go for more impact with a magazine-style cover, and asked us to work on a final round of features prototypes, above. (Also at this point, after a little debate, the name ExFiles was killed in favor of using the day of the week as the section header, with the subheading “Arts & Culture.”) In this format, we found that some photos treated in a routine way in the broadsheet suddenly sprung off the page with dramatic crops. A number of these feature prototypes were used in training to show the staff how to make the most of a dynamic, but highly restricted, set of new fonts, and how to make their already good feature headlines even better.

2 FEATURES PROTOTYPE 1: The

possibility of a black-and-white press position for the features cover actually worked to the advantage of this illustration when placed in its new tabloid home. Respecting the limitations of the paper’s news hole, a twostory cover (with two more stories in promo form) was originally proposed.

4 TODAY: The live features

covers show some variety built into the formats for sections like Television and Travel. www.snd.org

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Making more with less In most redesigns, you look for opportunities to improve the product, reorganizing content, and in some cases, trying to get more impact with fewer resources. In reviewing the Examiner, I noticed there was not a weekly food section per se. Rather, food coverage (which was good for a limited staff, with quality writing from Patricia Unterman and Jeremiah Tower) was sprinkled throughout the Wednesday Ex Files (features) section. Here was an opportunity to create something “new” without committing any additional resources.

THE SKETCH PROCESS: In preliminary drawings made during meetings to discuss the new features sections, I began to flesh out concepts for a brand-new section to showcase food and dining coverage. Many details shown here made it into the final version.

2 AFTER: We cheekily

1 BEFORE: Food was displayed in the

daily features section, often with a prominent cover story, but inside pages were a mix of food, lifestyle, arts and television coverage. If readers even found their way to this section, it might have been hard to distinguish one topic area from another.

called this prototype for a new food section “S.F. Eats!,” a name that stuck.

The lead headline was rewritten (often the case on our prototypes) and displayed in Ziggurat for more impact. In addition to a focused half-dozen or so pages on food and dining (using existing content), the redesign also more clearly organized the daily arts and lifestyles coverage.

THE STYLEBOOK: Garcia Media created a 120-page design guide for the Examiner. Included were a look at the paper’s font list, and a description of how they were used. Ziggurat Black (a slab serif by Jonathan Hoefler chosen for its distinctive italic variation) is used for some section headers. (Maybe it’s a San Francisco thing, but no one blinked at the italics. Said one of the paper’s owners on launch night: “I like that font. It has a ’70s thing going on, kinda groovy and San Francisco.”)

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A sports design to “flip over” We recommended that the Examiner print its sports section – which begins on the back page – “upside down.”

As Executive Editor Zoran Basich wrote to his readers on Day One: “This isn’t a mistake, sports fan.

Our sports and classified sections are purposefully printed upside down from the news and features sections. It’s for convenience and fun.

“Tabloids typically start their sports sections on the back page. But usually this means the reader has to reverse his or her usual practice and read from right to left, burrowing back into the paper to read the stories. By flipping the whole section, we give the reader a complete sports section you can navigate in the usual fashion.”

Without a precedent for daily tabloid reading in the city, the readers got used to it immediately. In honor of this daring decision, we’re closing this case study with a page you’ll really “flip over.” (Forgive us... too many trips to San Francisco does weird things to a consultant!) – Ron Reason.

NOT AS CRAZY AS IT MAY LOOK! Early in the prototype stage, some editors were concerned that Examiner readers (particularly commuters) might feel “self conscious” about being seen reading a newspaper whose back cover appears to be printed upside-down. Careful explanation to readers was the key to avoiding any misunderstanding. No one called to express concern or alarm that the paper must have made a printing mistake.

SPORTS WITH PUNCH: Once readers realize they have to do “the flip,” they find a sports cover with impact - usually one large photo, a large headline, and several promos, including (usually) an anchored promo to the best sports commentary of the day. Below is one of the first six sports cover prototypes which was perceived as a bit too busy. It also incorporates the original name of the section, which was later abandoned.

They said it ...

Dan Fost (media critic of the San Francisco Chronicle, “reviewing” a copy of an early press test): “It has a snazzy, big-city feel with big headlines and sassy columns ...”

Executive Editor Zoran Basich (introducing the new look and format to readers): “Philosophically, we want to commit completely to the long and lively tradition of rollicking newspapering in San Francisco...

We believe this format fits the busy, get-to-the-point-but-do-itwith-flair style of the city.”

Page One Design Editor Tom Borromeo: “One of the first things we heard after the relaunch is that people appreciated the larger news hole and expanded sports coverage. This amused us, because the news hole wasn’t any bigger (and might have been smaller), and the sports was the same as ever. What this taught me is how much the poor design of the broadsheet had robbed us of our work by making people perceive our newspaper as smaller than it was. In a sense, though, the readers were right in perceiving our news hole as larger – because the new design made it possible for them to easily access more of the contents of the paper – so in effect, they are getting more out of the new Examiner.”

Design Editor Bob Gower: “The best thing to come out of the redesign is that the staff is a little more relaxed now and have a clearer sense of their purpose. The redesign forced us to reevaluate our staffing levels and, though we are still close to being understaffed, there is a better understanding of what resources we need to do the job right.”

Credits: The Examiner redesign was directed by Ron Reason working closely with Dr. Mario Garcia and Garcia Media staff designers in Tampa and Buenos Aires, including special assistance by Ed Hashey who created the style guide and assisted with templating in Adobe InDesign. The Examiner’s in-house team was led by Executive Editor Zoran Basich and Design Director Bob Gower.

Dr. Mario Garcia (president, Garcia Media): “I have felt this was a trend whose time has come in the U.S. We have seen papers doing this (converting to tabloid from broadsheet) in Europe and South America, and the changes are almost always very well received. In the coming years, American publishers will see that tabloids are very popular and make sense in pursuing tightly edited, easily organized, and more economically produced newspapers. I am not one for predicting the future, but I put my money on lots of ‘surprises’ coming up as broadsheets, even well known ones, decide that less is best, small is handier, tabloid is it.”