Production & distribution
Exeter Observer is produced by a tiny newsroom with two staff. It has also published work by sixteen volunteer contributors since its launch in April 2019.
Its website is its primary publishing platform. It is designed in-house to convey high editorial standards and confer high search engine rankings while avoiding the clutter that crowds out content on other local channels.
It is delivered using a high-resilience network to provide fast page load times and is evolving continuously as new formats and tools arrive.
Exeter Observer also publishes The Exeter Digest, a free email newsletter, which contains a round-up of recent stories and a curated selection of community and culture events every few weeks.
It employs selected social media channels as well as printed materials to promote individual stories and reach new readers and communities of interest across the city.
“Journalism is printing what someone else does not want published; everything else is public relations.”
Often misattributed to George Orwell
Martin Redfern is Exeter Observer’s editor and a director of its publisher Exeter Observer Limited. He writes many of its news stories and features, leads on investigations and maintains the website.
Martin is an accredited UK press card holder, a member of the Chartered Institute of Journalists and the Society of Editors and holds a masters degree in Journalism with distinction at Birkbeck, University of London.
Leigh Curtis is Exeter Observer’s deputy editor and membership co-ordinator and a director of its publisher Exeter Observer Limited. She writes most of our community and culture stories, some news and features and manages our growing membership.
She holds a degree in Fine Art at Goldsmiths, University of London, and leads on design and marketing as well as dealing with Exeter Observer’s financial and administrative management including member meetings.
Leigh is also an accredited UK press card holder and a member of the National Union of Journalists.
“It is a necessary condition of the freedom of the press to act in the public interest.”
Harold Evans, Sunday Times editor 1967-1981
Over the past five years Exeter Observer has published more than 550 news stories, features, investigations, community and culture previews, galleries, newsletters and special reports.
It often sets the local news agenda, offering insight about what’s going in Exeter that you won’t find anywhere else and breaking major stories only for legacy media to get the facts wrong and fail to scratch the surface.
Its website serves over a million page views each year and its readership and subscriber base have doubled in the past twelve months.
More about Exeter Observer
- A new kind of independent news organisation
- Distribution & promotion
- Democracy doesn't work when people don't know
- Legacy local news
- Exeter media in perspective
- Local news that matters
- References
Exeter Observer is published by Exeter Observer Limited, Community Benefit Society No. 8435 registered under the Co-operative and Community Benefit Societies Act 2014.
Our registered address is St Sidwell’s Community Centre, Sidwell Street, Exeter EX4 6NN.