Fort Worth Star-Telegram is reducing its print editions to focus on digital content, and many subscribers are not pleased.
A meeting was held last month with the newspaper’s subscribers at the Fort Worth Botanic Gardens. During the discussion, subscribers expressed concern that the newspaper would be reducing print editions to three days a week by mail.
“It was a complete waste of time,” an anonymous subscriber said of the August 29 meeting Star-Telegram staffers held for subscribers.
The Star-Telegram once had 350,000 subscribers during the 1990s but now has 27,000 in print and online as of 2024, per FWR.
Like most newspaper companies, the Star-Telegram is transitioning to a digital-only model due to declining revenue and collapsing subscriptions.
Star-Telegram President and Editor Steve Coffman told members of the Rotary Club of Fort Worth that although the paper has faced challenges, he is excited to transform the business into a digital one, per FWR.
“Despite some of this big bad news out there for the news industry, there’s reason to be excited and hopeful about the Star-Telegram and the future of local news with us,” Coffman said.
“We’re still paying the six-copy price?” asked one reader, referring to the previous print schedule of six days a week. “What’s the justification in that?”
According to a recent Gallup poll, trust in the mass media in America has reached an all-time low, as previously reported by The Dallas Express.
The Star-Telegram has been criticized in the past for some of its headlines. Tarrant County GOP Chairman Bo French pointed out one example.
“No one reads the Star Telegram anymore. Crap like this is why. Truly pathetic,” French posted on X.
French was reacting to a headline that read, “Daddy died a MAGA. His last words were apologies for how his Trumpism hurt our family.”
