BY VEENA RAO

Running a newspaper is no child’s play. Unless you have the passion, dogged perseverance, and the willingness to work long hours and take on many roles, chances are that you will wind up in a short time.

NRI Pulse has survived two years. It has been fun. It has been challenging. It has been a learning curve and a period of evolution. Growing from an impulsive idea to a media that is a household name in Atlanta and Alabama in two years is no mean feat!

Why run a newspaper? A newspaper- even a community newspaper- is a potent weapon to effectively influence several thousand readers. It is easy to get major news from around the world. But people are interested in the happenings in their local community, and in their country of residence. That is where we come in.

How powerful even a community newspaper can be, I have learned over the past two years, from the number of partnership requests I have received from successful businessmen. While some offers were indirect and others direct, the most amusing experience involved a respected community member who had once made a “gentleman’s promise to always support NRI Pulse”. Super successful and very soft spoken, the gentleman’s childish sense of entitlement came as a complete shock to me. When I approached him for an ad for our second anniversary special issue, I was rebuked with harsh words that implied: I asked you for partnership in your newspaper and you refused. I am not interested in supporting your paper with an ad.

The gentleman had neither made a direct request, nor do I remember having refused his request. The crabbiness was because I had not understood his hints at acquisition and offered him NRI Pulse on a platter.  Success gives you that sense of entitlement!

But this experience made me realize how strong a weapon a newspaper is, and why some of the movers and shakers of the community want a stake in the local media.

Running a newspaper often involves striking a fine balance between giving in to the client’s whims and holding your own. This has led to all kinds of situations with advertisers. While most advertisers stick to their commitments and are on time with payments, a handful will try to extract maximum mileage in terms of PR articles and then do the disappearing act when it comes to advertising. Some will advertise, but will make you chase them for payments, or insist they have paid- without ever issuing a check.

A free newspaper survives on advertising revenue. There have been times when we have started the month with zero ads. I remember when we lost five ads on the very same day last year! This happened a few days after my dad was diagnosed with cancer. I recall battling dejection at the curve balls thrown my way.  Dad did not survive cancer. But his favorite newspaper has miraculously bounced back each month. We have not only survived, but have grown in terms of circulation and reach.

In spite of all the challenges though, the past two years have been fruitful and satisfying.

The impulse to start a community newspaper gained foothold in my mind in May 2006. The idea was implanted there by a fellow journalist who saw great potential for a free newspaper to service the growing Atlanta South Asian communities.

Armed with the whim, I approached the local businesses and a few prominent people I knew. I had no prototype to show them, nor a business plan to discuss. All I could tell them was, “You know my work as a journalist. Please support me.”

The support was overwhelming. I will always be grateful to the doctors of AAPI, Mark Premji, Suresh Sheregar of Udipi Café, realtor Narender Reddy, attorney Chandler Sharma, Global Mall’s Shiv Aggarwal, Anjan and Dr. Indrani Duttagupta, Gandhi Foundation’s Anthony Thaliath and others for their support through ads and sponsorships in the initial challenging days. I am also indebted to my friend Frances West for her unwavering support through the past two years.

The next step was to put a team together. Sonu Patel, my friend and co-worker from Atlanta Samachar, (the first Atlanta based newspaper that we both worked for, had closed down a couple of years earlier) came on board as designer and art director. Despite a busy schedule and other deadline bound projects to work on, Sonu pitched in bravely and we toiled day and night to put the first issue together. Soon Lopa D. Chowdhury joined NRI Pulse as marketing associate. Now we were a real team!

The editorial department fast grew into a virtual who’s who of the Atlanta community. Journalists Ravi R. Ponangi, Kavita Chhibber, Dr. Mala Chakravorty and Mahadev Desai contributed news reports and reviews. Prominent community members Dr. Narsi Narasimhan, Narender Reddy, Chandler Sharma, and later P.S. Lakshmi Rao and Dr. Arun Misra turned articulate writers.

So far so good. This was fun. Even the challenges were fun. Like finding the right printer. We went from printer to printer, learning along the way that not every printer does newspaper print jobs. We finally found this very accommodating web printer whose quote fit our budget.

While there was no business strategy to begin with, I had made up my mind that our product would be a no frills free newspaper in tabloid size with focus on quality content. The overheads would be kept low in order to allow for a maximum 70:30 content-to-ad ratio. I wanted our readers to have real content to read, and not have to flip through pages in a vain attempt to find content.

The next big challenge was in distributing the newspaper. I went from business to business, seeking permission to set up our racks and leave copies of NRI Pulse for patrons to pick up. Within the second month we started getting calls from people, advising us to set up distribution points in new areas. Before we knew it, we were distributing at over 70 locations!

Today, NRI Pulse has expanded its team to include several new members- Mubashra Siddiqui, Jyothsna Hegde, Yesha Malik amongst others. Our team is young, bright and eager to serve. We are the only Indian media to service both Georgia and Alabama.

It is an overcrowded market jostling for attention. There are magazines of all shapes, sizes and languages out there. But I believe we will continue to thrive, simply because we have something to offer to the reader.

If you have suggestions for our improvement, or general comments about the newspaper, write to me at editor@nripulse.com.