Warroad, Minn., is again a town with a newspaper.
Less than two months after the Warroad Pioneer was put to bed for the last time, the city has a new weekly called the Warroad Advocate.
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Warren Advocate owners Mark Thiele, his wife, Kelly Schaible Thiele, and Julie and Rollin Bergman founded the newspaper after the 121-year-old Warroad Pioneer ceased publishing after its May 8 edition for financial reasons. The Bergmans also are the owners of a newspaper group called Page 1 Publications, which publishes the Exponent in East Grand Forks, the Tribune in Greenbush, the Northern Light in Williams and Baudette and the North Star News in Karlstad.
It didn’t take long after the Warroad Pioneer, which had a circulation of about 1,100, had stopped publishing for residents to miss having a newspaper in their community.
“When the Warroad Pioneer went dark, it seemed like there was a lack of information in the community,” said Mark Thiele, who, after meeting several times, he and his wife and the Bergmans decided to start a newspaper.
The Warroad Advocate published its first newspaper last week and it was mailed to about 3,000 residents of the Minnesota towns of Warroad, Salol and Roosevelt. The four owners are funding production of the newspaper and are aiming to build up enough advertising revenue to finance it.
Local freelance writers are supplying the content for the newspaper.
Besides the print publication, which the Warroad Advocate owners plan to publish 50 times per year, it also will be available on an app and in the Google Play store.
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