Alternative newspaper Nuvo ceasing print publication

Nuvo has ceased print publication and is eliminating most of its staff, the editor of the 29-year-old local alternative newspaper announced Saturday on social media.

"I’ve done everything in my power not to have to share this news but it has happened,” Editor Laura McPhee said on Twitter. “Wednesday’s edition of @NuvoIndy was the last issue of the paper and the staff’s last week of employment.”

McPhee told IBJ that a significantly different form of Nuvo would continue to exist online. She said the company would maintain three employees to continue those operations but was shedding eight full-time workers. She is among those losing their jobs.

Ceasing print publication also will have an impact on as many as 40 people who do part-time work for Nuvo, including freelance writers and drivers, McPhee said.

News Editor Rob Burgess, who joined Nuvo in August, will continue to work for Nuvo along with a web designer and an IT employee, McPhee said.

Nuvo operated as a weekly print publication from its founding in 1990 until November before cutting back the print schedule to every other week.

Nuvo's free weekly print edition had seen circulation fall from about 47,800 in 2011 to about 26,000 last year.

McPhee said “we knew this was probably inevitable, but we did everything we could to prevent it.”

Nuvo's problems are similar to those seen throughout the newspaper industry, she said. Advertising dollars are harder to attract, and even though people still want content to read, many are unwilling to pay for it.

McPhee said publisher and owner Keven McKinney, who founded the newspaper, is exploring turning Nuvo into an online-only, membership-supported publication with no advertising. The site would concentrate on news and not arts coverage. 

McKinney could not immediately be reached for comment.

McPhee, who was senior writer and news editor at Nuvo from 2004 to 2011, rejoined the publication as editor in January 2018.

"We made it 29 years, and that’s something to be very proud of," she said. "I was around for 14 of those years, and have zero regrets. I’m proud of the work we did, the stories we told, and the friendships that will continue to bind us all together."