This month marks 19 years of working in the newspaper industry.
Through nearly two decades (I can’t believe it’s been that long), I have been a part of countless newspaper promotions featuring important information with the help of newspaper advertisers.
Many of the promotions have helped businesses bring people through their doors. They have also led to events being financially successful in communities impacted by the newspaper I worked for at the time.
While I’m proud of the successes of those endeavors, my favorite promotion ever is when we started the Recovery Group listing in our newspaper this past February.
For one issue a month the past seven months, we have put together a listing of 16 area faith-based recovery groups that are ready to meet the needs of those living in the area who are struggling with addiction.
The focus of this promotion is not to make a big profit.
Instead, its primary focus is to provide a valuable resource to those battling addiction and to those trying to help others with this problem, but don’t know where to start.
This promotion is effectively changing lives and it is something our staff is proud to be a part of.
Our Recovery Group promotion was the vision of our sales representative Alonda Jones.
Alonda shared the passion to do something like this when she started working for our company in May 2019.
She expressed how the Lord layed this heavily on her heart as a former addict herself who has been blessed with the help of these same several recovery groups.
With her hard work and research, this vision became a reality and was published for the first time in February. It offers addresses and phone numbers for a variety of faith-based groups. There are also some meeting times available.
Along with the listing, we have been putting the spotlight on one recovery group each month with a brief profile story.
Unfortunately, as each month has went by, we have lost sponsors for this section. We are now down to just four sponsors who have stayed on as big supporters of this endeavor.
The display was once larger than a half page, but due to our sponsor list decreasing, it is now the smallest size it has ever been. Advertising space in newspapers is not only valuable, but it is also limited as we have to closely monitor advertising percentages in our publication.
We may not be able to continue this important promotion for too long without the support of more sponsors who appreciate the value and impact of this promotion.
The Lord has layed this on my heart to reach out to our readers and advertisers to encourage more support for this program.
There is a bigger vision for this promotion that we would love to see become a reality.
Our hope is to begin writing profile stories on addicts living in our area whose lives have been transformed forever due to the impact of one or more recovery groups on our list. I know I’m eager to shed some tears with others in this area as they tell me their stories and I get to put them in black and white for all of you to read.
As a Christian, I’m looking forward to hearing countless individuals share about how God changed their lives and transformed their family dynamic.
For those struggling with addiction, they have to see hope and love in a time they need it more than they ever have before. Please help in getting this message of hope out to our community.
If you are interested in wanting to sponsor this effort, the cost is just $20 per month. You can make arrangements with Alonda by emailing ads2@ozarkmedia.com or calling her at the office at 417-926-5148.
