We’re a small business, too

On East Main Street in downtown Lexington is a little blue house. That’s us. We love our location, its proximity to O’Hara’s Bakery, Old Mill Brewpub, a few spas and many other small businesses that are vital parts of Lexington County’s small business community.

I’ve heard it multiple times: “Lexington County loves its small businesses.” I’ve also heard this multiple times: “I shouldn’t have to pay to read the newspaper.” And this: “The newspaper should be covering this.”

I have written about a ton of small businesses. I’ve learned about their humble beginnings. Their early and current struggles. Their stories.

The common thread in all their successes was community support.

And readers love those stories. They find small businesses’ small beginnings inspiring.

The Lexington County Chronicle is a small business, too. But I have found some people are less thrilled with our small beginnings.

We are a newspaper that transitioned to new leadership in 2021. We are so grateful for the original owners and publisher, but in this new chapter, we must work tirelessly to get up to speed with this digitally driven world, and we have a way to go.

I was sitting in a Lexington County Council meeting on Nov. 22, 2024, when I heard the following from a council member: “I also attended the Lexington County Fire Services Award Banquet a few days ago. … A lot of good awards were given for things that the newspaper should be reporting. I feel like that when you rescue someone and you save a life, it should make the newspaper, but I’m not in the newspaper and I don’t write articles, but that would have been something that the news should have been there to report on so that the community will know how well our first responders work together as a unified bunch to help Lexington County be better.”

I did not disagree with that sentiment. That’s a great story to cover, but our capabilities to be in so many places at once are limited.

I have never worked in a community where so few of its leaders subscribe to the newspaper. Yet, they tell me what to cover often.

This is an industry trend; I know it’s not just the Chronicle.

Local newspapers, whether new and tiny, established and growing or old and needing a revamp, are seldom extended the same respect or grace other small businesses are amid their beginnings or rebrandings.

This is perhaps because of a growing distrust in the media. Every industry has bad seeds that fan distrustful flames; that’s not specific to newspapers. My industry is flawed. I know that. Odds are, yours is, too. And I wish nothing but continued support for the good apples in your industry.

Where the Chronicle (and so many other community newspapers) differs from national TV or large news outlets is that we’re local. We live in your community with you, so we want our community to prosper just as much as you do.

America’s Newspapers 2023 Local Newspaper Study conducted by Coda Ventures found that 87% of newspaper readers feel they have a responsibility to help shape the futures of their communities.

That’s why communities prosper with local news. Local newspapers need community support. Communities need good journalists who live in their communities. Who shop at your grocery stores. Who send their kids to the same schools you send yours to.

The following is from my mentor and editor of our sister paper, The Sumter Item, Kayla Green: “When a community does not have a local news source, its residents have less access to critical information needs. Simply put, they know less about what's going on around them. Whether it's information about candidates in an upcoming election or whether it's coverage of policy decisions being made in city council and school board meetings or recaps of high school sports, lists of upcoming events you can bring the family to or profiles on people and organizations, the more you know, the more you can make informed decisions for you and your family.”

The Chronicle has three full-time journalists, including myself.

Three journalists who want to shake your hand, look you in the eye and hear your side of the story.

But three journalists, no matter how nice, how patient, how understanding and hard-working, are not enough to cover everything you care about – I care about – in a county this large.

I am proud of the work we do. The goal is to bring you informative, accurate and fair reporting on the things you care about so you can make informed decisions for your benefit, your family’s and your workplace’s.

Additionally, we want to further our identity in the community so that when councilmembers or residents want to see something in the paper that’s not in there already, they can feel free to call me, or one of my awesome reporters, and tell us about it.

There’s no one pipeline where we get our story ideas. Often, we won’t know about something if you don’t tell us. We won’t know about the Lexington County Fire Services Award Banquet unless you tell us.

But just like every other small business, we cannot make that happen without your support. Your subscription. Your decision to advertise with us. Your story ideas.

It is a privilege, not a right, to have so many wonderful small businesses in our community. You may not like to hear it, but local news is a privilege, not a right, as well.

Bryn Eddy is the editor of the Lexington County Chronicle.