Our changing media landscape: Kawartha Lakes Weekly and the Advocate

Sometimes businesses are forced to react to changing events and sometimes they plan for it. At Fireside Publishing House, your all-local independent media company in Kawartha Lakes, we’ve been doing both lately.

You have likely noticed the printing quality of the newspaper has markedly improved. We have recently started printing our newspaper at Quebecor Media – and they are fantastic. (In case you were wondering, there are no local printers who have the capability to print newspapers.)

With the sudden announcement that PostMedia was exiting the delivery business nationwide, your favourite local newspaper was affected. So we made a deliberate decision to protect the long‑term future of Kawartha Lakes Weekly by shifting to a model that still reaches across the city.

Canada Post will now take care of our home delivery in our three largest population centres — Lindsay, Bobcaygeon and Fenelon Falls, including the rural area around the villages. All of this will be supported by a network of drop boxes across Kawartha Lakes to keep other rural readers connected. This ensures the weekly newspaper remains strong, stable, and able to serve local businesses for years to come, reaching about 26,000 readers per week.

We will keep delivering the local coverage you expect. Council coverage, community events, editorials, sports, non-profit support, local business news, and culture. And of course we’ve never been just a newspaper.

Within a month, stay tuned for an exciting announcement about The Lindsay Advocate’s brand-new website – Advocate Online. More content than ever, more tools to be engaged, more ways to reach readers. It’s something that has been in the planning for many months and which readers will love.

Local media options are shrinking across Canada — but not here. Fireside Publishing House is committed to keeping community journalism alive. By affirming our new delivery model for the newspaper, enhancing the Advocate experience, and expanding our digital presence, we’re building a stronger foundation for the future of local storytelling.

As we move forward, our commitment is the same as it has always been – to reflect the voices, concerns, and celebrations of the people who live here. In the end, the strength of a local newspaper has never come from how it arrives, but from why it exists.

Our role is to pay attention to the decisions that shape daily life, to the stories that reveal who we are, and to the moments that bind our many communities together. We’ll continue to show up, ask questions, listen closely, and tell the stories that matter here.

The work continues, and we’re grateful to do it alongside you.