The Sheffield Star, South Yorkshire Daily Newspaper

...review of my local Newspaper the Sheffield Star was well overdue, but I have been waiting for Ciao to add it as a product category. Now that it has finally been added I guess that there is no excuse so here goes….

THE BASIC INFORMATION

The Sheffield Star is Sheffield's only daily Newspaper. It is published by Sheffield Newspapers Ltd and is colloquially known within its circulation area simply as the Star, which it will ...
.../> The Star is published Monday to Saturday and circulated throughout South Yorkshire, North East Derbyshire and North Nottinghamshire. The daily circulation of this Newspaper was 182,237 as at the 1st February 2005.

There are three different regional variations published other than the main Sheffield version. These regional versions cover Rotherham, Doncaster and Barnsley and have an emphasis on more local stories, although the bulk ... more

I thought that a review of my local Newspaper the Sheffield Star was well overdue, but I have been waiting for Ciao to add it as a product category. Now that it has finally been added I guess that there is no excuse so here goes….

THE BASIC INFORMATION

The Sheffield Star is Sheffield's only daily Newspaper. It is published by Sheffield Newspapers Ltd and is colloquially known within its circulation area simply as the Star, which it will be referred to as hereafter in this review.

The Star is published Monday to Saturday and circulated throughout South Yorkshire, North East Derbyshire and North Nottinghamshire. The daily circulation of this Newspaper was 182,237 as at the 1st February 2005.

There are three different regional variations published other than the main Sheffield version. These regional versions cover Rotherham, Doncaster and Barnsley and have an emphasis on more local stories, although the bulk of all editions are pretty much the same and they will always cover the same main stories. All of these versions are printed in Sheffield but there are regional offices in Rotherham, Doncaster and Barnsley feeding the local community stories to these regional editions.

There are two daily editions published the first called the "Early edition" reaches the shops around Lunchtime and the "City Late" edition reaches the shops around 3.30pm. It is not unusual for these editions to carry different headlines.

A BIT OF INFO ABOUT SHEFFIELD NEWSPAPERS LTD

Sheffield Newspapers Ltd also publish several other Newspapers within the same distribution area. These include the following:

- The Green 'Un - This is weekly Newspaper which is green in colour, hence its name. It is published every Saturday and is a Sports Paper with a local emphasis. There is a full roundup of all Sports activities. The bulk of the Paper is taken up by the days Football matches and there are full match reports for all local teams.

- Sheffield Telegraph - This is a weekly Newspaper published every Friday. It costs 70p and contains over 50 pages of mainly local News from the week that has just gone. It also contains the Sheffield Property Guide. Circulation is 26,778 (as at 1/2/05).

- Sheffield Property Guide - This is published every Friday and given away free with the Sheffield Telegraph. It contains approximately 40 pages of local Properties for sale. It is a free Newspaper which is also distributed to (and available from) many local Estate Agents.

- Sheffield Weekly Gazette - This is a free weekly Newspaper delivered direct through the letterboxes of 109,546 (as at 1/2/05) Homes within Sheffield. Incorporated within this is the Sheffield Motor Guide. It is published every Thursday.

Sheffield Motor Guide - This is given away free with the Sheffield Weekly Gazette and contains details of local Vehicles for sale, plus Motor related articles and reviews. It is also available from some Petrol Forecourts within Sheffield.

- Sheffield Journal - Like the Sheffield Weekly Gazette this is another free Weekly Newspaper delivered direct to 60,775 (as at 1/2/05) Homes every Thursday. It has a different distribution area to the Gazette with a more Southerly bias within Sheffield.

Sheffield Newspapers Ltd are themselves now owned by Johnston Press PLC. Johnson Newspapers PLC own over 50 different regional groups of Newspapers covering the whole of the UK and are now recognised as one of the UK's leading media publishing companies.

THE HISTORY OF THE STAR

The Newspaper that I have always grown up started off life as the Sheffield Evening Telegraph and was first published on the 7th June 1887. A year after the Sheffield Evening Telegraph was first published it changed its name to the Sheffield Evening Telegraph and Star.

In 1898 the Newspaper became the Yorkshire Telegraph and Star and kept this name until 1937 when it became the Telegraph and Star and then finally after the war it became known simply as the Star.

My Grandmother still referred to this Newspaper as the Telegraph and Star right up to the day that she died last year, and it is still quite common to hear it referred to as this by the older generation of the City.

When I was young my Parents always had the Star delivered every night and they still do today. Back in those days the Newspaper was in the large Broadsheet format but in 1981 they introduced a smaller Tabloid sized version. This was initially trialled on a Saturday only but within a few Months this smaller format was adopted as the norm for all of the days of the week.

THE FORMAT

The front page always carries the main story of the day in line with all other Newspapers on sale in the UK and the back few pages are always dedicated to Sport.

The main headline story is usually accompanied by a large photograph and is generally a story with some local bias, although if something very noteworthy has happened then the headline will be the same as those at a National level.

The next few pages are more local news stories and then there is a section which covers more National stories.

Regular features each night include the Letters Page, Showbuzz, the TV Guide, Notice Board, What's On and the Classifieds:

- The Letters Page is fairly self explanatory and contains around half a dozen reader's letters each night. There is a £10 prize awarded for the "Star" letter each night. The letters published here can basically be about anything but the general theme is for the writer to have a bit of a moan.

- Showbuzz - This is a section relating to showbiz stories of the day with a bit of gossip. These are generally short abridged versions of stories lifted from the morning's Tabloids.

- The TV Guide - This section contains all of the days TV listings for all terrestrial, digital and Sky Channels. There are also all Radio listings for both National and Local radio Stations.
The listings for each day begin at 11am and run through to 6pm the following day. I think this is a nice touch as there are a surprisingly large number of people for whom this is the only TV/Radio Guide that they see each day. and therefore it carries them through until their next Star arrives.

- Notice Board - This page contains lots of useful local information including details of late night Pharmacists and emergency out of hours Dental and Veterinary services etc.

- What's On - This page contains all details relating to what is currently being shown at all local Cinemas and Theatres, plus information on any Bands which may be playing right down to the local bands that may be playing in a cupboard above your local shops.

- Classifieds - This is quite a large section which begins with "Announcements" which has Births, Marriages, and Deaths etc. as well as good luck messages and congratulations on passing tour exams...driving test...etc...

Continuing on from here the Classifieds have sections relating to articles for sale, and articles wanted etc.

OTHER FEATURES

As well as the above there is a daily weather summary, daily Horoscopes, Crosswords, Puzzles, Competitions and quite often Prize Bingo.

Each Tuesday there is a supplementary pull out paper called "Drive" which contains lots of information on Motoring issues and each Friday there is a pull out called "What's On?" which is an expanded version of the daily column and contains reviews of events and shows from the previous week.

Each Thursday is Jobs night and there are generally up to 15 pages of local job vacancies. The Thursday edition of the Star is the second highest selling edition of the week for this reason, after Saturday.

CONCLUSION

I find that Star is an excellent local Newspaper with a very high level of Journalism. There are virtually no sensational or scandalous tabloid style stories and most stories are handled in a sensible and informative way.

It currently costs 35p and is all available from almost all Newsagents within its distribution area. It can also be bought from several street vendors in the city centre.

For further information the contact details are as below:

The Star
York Street
Sheffield
S1 1PU

Telephone : 0114 2767676

Thank you for reading.

 

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