As a part of our goal to operate for the public benefit, Civic Spark Media and the Western Wayne News will provide regular updates to the community on our operations, health and future plans. This is our latest community report, reflecting activities for both the Western Wayne News newspaper and the WayneCounty.info news aggregator in the second quarter of 2025.
See also: 2025Q1, 2024, 2023Q4, 2023Q3, 2023Q2, 2023Q1, 2022Q4.
By the Numbers
Q2 2025 Finances
These financial reports are unaudited and unofficial, but we believe them to be complete and accurate as of this publishing. Rounded to the nearest hundred.
- Income
- Advertising sales: $85,700
- Newspaper subscriptions & individual sales: $55,800
- Miscellaneous income: $225
- Donations: $0
- Expenses
- Employee payroll & contractors: $90,700
- Newspaper printing: $20,900
- Postage & delivery: $9,400
- Rent, office expenses & utilities: $9,100
- Software and online services: $4,300
- Charitable contributions: $3,000
- Advertising & marketing: $2,600
- Credit card processing & bank fees: $2,100
- Insurance: $800
- Travel: $300
- Other expenses: $30
- Depreciation & amortization: $0
- Legal and accounting service fees: $0
Other Metrics of Interest
As of July 15, 2025
- Western Wayne News subscriber households
- Print: 3,300
- Online: 870
- Western Wayne News retail location copies distributed weekly: 550
- WayneCounty.info daily newsletter subscribers: 820
- Civic Spark Media team
- Full-Time Employees: 4
- Part-Time Employees: 2
- Contractors: 16
Notes
Some milestones and notes from the second quarter of 2025:
- We’ve continued to adjust our USPS postal delivery procedures to address ongoing concerns with newspaper delivery delays and missing papers. We are paying additional fees every week to have papers dropped off at some area post offices directly where possible, instead of waiting for USPS to route those papers internally.
- We celebrated winning several awards as our reporting and photography were recognized at the Best in Indiana Journalism awards ceremony on May 2. WWN photographer Joshua Smith received awards for his news and features photography appearing in various issues of the Western Wayne News throughout 2024. WWN reporters Mike Emery, Millicent Martin Emery, Chris Hardie, Dan Harney and Jenny Pugh received a first-place award for their breaking news reporting about the April 8, 2024, solar eclipse. The team’s coverage included stories, photos and reports from the field as the cosmic spectacle unfolded, shared online and in our print edition.
- We’ve been navigating ongoing increases in the costs of producing and delivering the newspaper, in part due to tariffs imposed at the federal level on imported goods. Postage, newspaper ink, printing plates and newsprint costs have all gone up, and we expect those prices to continue rising.
- While this quarter was the first unprofitable quarterly period since Civic Spark Media took over ownership of the Western Wayne News in October 2022, we do not see this as a significant long-term concern. We made some additional investments in internal infrastructure and capacity that we expect to bring value to our team and readers over time.
- We continue to look for a well-qualified Business Manager to administer multiple aspects of our daily business operations. (Do you want to be a part of keeping the community informed and connected? We’re hiring for other roles as well.)
- We produced a new trifold brochure that helps guide people through the process of placing a public notice in the newspaper as a part of family law cases, name changes, and related cases. With instructions in both English and Spanish, our hope is that it helps community members visiting the Wayne County Courthouse in what might already be a stressful or confusing time to get their legally required notice placed quickly and efficiently. Here’s what several of the panels look like:
- We hit 25,000 “tickets” in our customer support software system, where each ticket represents an incoming call, email, Facebook message or other contact from readers, advertisers and others. We started using this system in late 2022, so we estimate that our small team is handling an average of 25 inquiries per day.
- We crossed the point where a majority of our readers` subscriptions are now managed through their online account on our website, as opposed to through calling, mailing in checks or visiting us in person. (We offer this option for efficiency but we still very much enjoy seeing/hearing from our readers!)