On this day 15 years ago, in 2010, ARLnow published its first post.
In an era of the internet where blogs were ascendant, Facebook was still a private company and, most people browsed the web on a desktop computer, it was relatively uncommon for a community to have an online-only news source of any kind.
Our biggest challenge at first was getting people to read us. Thankfully, a few big breaking news stories — including the prolific snowstorms that winter — helped us gain traction as people found us on Google and shared links with friends and coworkers on social media and via email.
Back then algorithmic feeds had not yet taken over, so once people discovered ARLnow they would often bookmark the site or follow our feed directly via RSS. Our editorial approach — with shorter articles, original photos and a hyperlocal, on-the-ground narrative style — was novel compared to what was being published on the clunky websites of legacy news outlets at the time.
We launched without a business plan, to be honest. But once people started reading us, a few intrepid local advertisers started to inquire about placing ads. In response, we had to figure out what to offer and how to price it. But those early advertisers were the exception, not the rule. Many people we talked to dismissed online advertising as a sort of fad and stuck to whatever was tried and true for them, sometimes literally chasing us out of their business, offended at being approached by “bloggers.”
Eventually, though, ARLnow continued to grow in both readership, revenue and personnel. Today we have two other sites, ALXnow and FFXnow, and a handful of other local publishers we partner with. The team is 12 people, including at five on the news side for ARLnow.
It’s been a heck of a ride and there’s more to come. We’re not going to jinx this year with an in person event, like we did just before the pandemic for the 10th anniversary. But suffice to say we’re very proud of how we’ve grown and very, very thankful to the readers, advertisers, members, sources, employees, partners and others who have helped us along the way.
P.S. If you’d like to get a framed print of the original illustration above, we’ve extended the ARLnow Shop for a couple of weeks so you can get it here. It was originally slated to be the cover for a special edition print magazine that has since been scrapped, so consider it a collector’s item!
