Media group appoints Maxim

On this day: 27 April 2004

A regional newspaper publisher appointing a PR agency to help it promote itself to the trade press and engage with stakeholders may seem a strange gig at first glance. However, it had recognised that while it was good at reporting on other people’s news it was open to ideas on how best to tell its own story.

Kent Messenger Group (now KM Media Group) was evolving. It had established a network of radio stations which later became KMFM, strengthening its position in the market against significant national competition. The group recognised it needed help in reaching out to the trade media, other local consumer titles, as well informing stakeholders of the new stations, titles and senior appointments. This is something which Maxim did, and still does, day-in day-out for many businesses, so it was a good fit to work together.

We were called on to help launch two new free titles. Looking back to their launch on this day in 2004 it’s a good example of how the media landscape has evolved during our three decades in business.

The KM Bexley Extra and KM Bromley Extra were part of the Kent Messenger Group’s push into the London boroughs in the days when free newspapers still generated advertising revenue and strong readership – and before the Internet was truly adopted by the media.

The Bexley title alone was distributed free to 70,000 of the 95,000 households across the Borough of Bexley, and had a seven-strong editorial team including a news editor, three reporters, two sub-editors and a photographer.

Those days are long gone, and both titles were consigned to history.

While working for the KM Group, Maxim announced the retirement of Edwin Boorman’s reign as chairman and his succession by his daughter Geraldine Allinson. We announced performance milestones, initiatives with cross-Channel partners, and acquisitions.

The reality was it was just like many businesses with a good story to tell, it just needed help telling them. It was a little strange having to get press releases signed off by the Group’s Editorial Director, but it did hone our own news sense.