Michelle Bhatti believes in newspapers. What’s more, she believes in the future of newspapers.
“I’m so excited about what’s ahead of us,” says the Courier’s new publisher.
She’s not faking it. Nor is she naïve. Although she’s only in her mid-thirties, she’s been in the newspaper business for almost half her life. Starting as a sales representative in the Lower Mainland when she was 19, more recently she led the Courier’s sales team as the director of advertising, overseeing its growth in the digital market.
She’s well aware of the challenges that newspapers face but she’s fueled by the side of the business that matters most to her — providing people with the stories that give shape to their lives.
“I really love telling the community stories and that we’re engaged with what’s happening locally.”
With a weekly circulation of 107,000 copies, “print readership is extremely strong,” she says. “We are the only paper in Vancouver that delivers door to door every week for free. That’s pretty amazing.
“And it’s because we see the benefit of that. It’s great for our advertisers but it’s to make sure that people are informed about what’s going on in their backyard. I’m so proud of that. It’s pretty powerful.”
The power of newspapers really struck home when she was living in India for several months. Her only link with the rest of the world came bundled in the pages of The Times of India, which she read cover to cover every day.
It’s not that reading a newspaper was a new experience for her but, for the first time, she really realized their ability to create connections that can only happen through shared awareness.
As a teenager growing up in South Surrey, Bhatti had dismissed the idea of working in newspapers. That’s what her parents did and, of course, every teenager thinks that whatever their parents do must be boring.
But being so far from home really helped her understand why they were willing to dedicate their lives to the business.
Her family’s involvement with newspapers as a business began the day her maternal grandfather walked into the office of the Drayton Valley Western Review in rural Alberta to post a classified. He walked out as the paper’s new owner.
Her mother and father — Barbara and Barry Baniulis — met at a newspaper conference. They split the cost of a raffle ticket and ended up winning a trip together. A year later, they decided to forego a formal wedding and got married in their living room. The money they saved was used as a down payment to buy the Whitecourt Star, a newspaper in a small town outside Edmonton.
“I said I’d never do this,” Bhatti says with a laugh, sitting in her office that looks onto West Fifth Avenue.
When she was 19, she accepted the offer of a part-time sales job at the Aldergrove Star, thinking it would only be temporary, and hasn’t looked back since.
“I do deeply love it,” she says. “I love the history, I love the smell of the press. There’s such beauty in the stories we’re able to tell. We’re this amazing resource for the community and the way we’re able to connect with people. Having the digital presence allows us to expand our reach, our audience, and the information we provide. We’re not limited by page counts. To me, digital is not in a competition with print. It complements what we do.
“It’s a pretty cool business.”
Bhatti is taking over as publisher from Alvin Brouwer, who continues to be the president of Lower Mainland Publishing LP and Glacier Community Media Digital. The company has been steadily growing both its newspaper staff and its various digital marketing teams and the move allows him to focus on the opportunities that this side of the business present.
And as proud as Bhatti is to be chosen as publisher at a young age, the fact that her name is on the masthead of the Vancouver Courier is deeply important to her.
“This is my place; this is my work family,” she says. “I’m really proud to be with Glacier Media and I love our team at the Vancouver Courier. What we’re doing is really powerful and we’re with a company that’s embracing digital but understanding the strength of what print does.
“It’s not that I get to be publisher that excites me. It’s that I get to be publisher here.”
Martha Perkins is the editor-in-chief of the Courier.
