The Lake Norman area media landscape is continuing to evolve this spring. On the heels of the April closing of weekly The Lake Norman Times, a group of investors, led by a Huntersville town board member, is planning to start a new weekly called the Lake Norman Citizen.

Also in this column, Seaweed Designs, a home décor and art boutique at South Main Square, says it will lease its space to a photographer as owner Cathy MacQueen focuses on building her wholesale and website sales.

SEAWEED DESIGNS SHIFTS GEARS

Seaweed Designs owner Cathy MacQueen said Friday she will be leasing her South Main Square retail shop to Craig Michael Photography as she focuses on a part of her business that is growing fast – wholesale and web sales of her “coastal cottage” home décor and art products.

Ms. MaQueen said wholesale and website orders are “up significantly” for her product lines, in part because of notice she received in March in the Spring 2009 Better Homes & Gardens special-interest “Decorating” magazine.

Seaweed Designs is 12 years old. Ms. MacQueen opened the South Main Square boutique two years ago, adding retail sales to her previous work designing and marketing her products. She says the extra 40 hours a week operating the store has divided her attention, sometimes forcing her close the shop to work on the non-retail side of the business.

She jumped at the opportunity recently to lease the shop to Craig Michael Photography, which she said would be a “welcome addition to the South Main Arts District.”

Read her full press release below.

NEW NEWSPAPER

A group of investors is planning to launch a new weekly paper called Lake Norman Citizen in mid-June, covering an area stretching from Exit 18 to the Iredell County line.

The weekly print newspaper will cover news and issues in the Lake Norman region, according to co-founder Charles Jeter, who will be the paper’s president. Mr. Jeter runs a Cornelius-based trucking company, IFCL, and serves on the Huntersville Board of Commissioners. His partners include Theresa Julian, the wife of Ron Julian, another Huntersville commissioner.

The paper has begun assembling a staff with a goal of mailing its first issue in mid-June. Many of the staff members have worked in the past at the Hunterville Herald, now known as Lake Norman Herald Weekly. They include publisher Kim Clark and editor Andrew Warfield.

Mr. Jeter said he and his fellow investors decided to start the new paper in part as a response to recent changes at the Herald, which was acquired this year by Carolina Newspaper Group, owner of the Charlotte Weekly and other publications ringing Charlotte.

“I don’t want to say anything bad about the Herald,” Mr. Jeter said in an interview Friday. As a town commissioner over the past two years, he has been in its pages often. The most recent appearance came last week, in an article that quoted another Huntersville commissioner as saying it would be a conflict of interest for Mr. Jeter to own a local newspaper.

Mr. Jeter brushes off the criticism, saying he is starting the paper because the Herald has shifted away from local news and toward “good news and features.” “We want to get back to the news,” he said. To succeed in newspaper publishing, he said, “You’ve got to provide news you can’t get anywhere else.”

He said he aspires for the paper to become a sort of local “60 Minutes,” with investigations and hard news about Huntersville, Cornelius, Davidson and other area communities.

The Herald article last week cited critics’ concerns that Mr. Jeter might try to use the paper as a political tool. But he says the paper won’t take sides. He noted that he and Mr. Julian are on opposite sides of most issues on the Huntersville board. He said the paper would not survive if it became partisan. “It’s a self policing issue. If we went down that track (being political), we’d lose our credibility with readers,” he said.

He said there’s room for another weekly paper in the area, as other publications disappear or pull back. The daily Charlotte Observer “doesn’t cover us anymore,” and another local weekly, the Lake Norman Times recently went out of business.

The Lake Norman Citizen will go to press on Wednesdays and will be mailed to about 25,000 households in north Mecklenburg, according to Mr. Jeter. He views mail as a better approach than unsolicited delivery onto people’s lawns or sidewalks, a tactic used by the Lake Norman Herald.

[Followup, June 12, 2009: The new Citizen hits mailboxes, while the Lake Norman Herald offers curbside tubes for readers.]

RELATED COVERAGE

April 2, 2009, Denver newspaper to expand north around the lake.”

March 31, 2009, Lake Norman Times to cease publication April 15″

NETWORKING GROUP  MEETS

THURSDAY, MAY 28, 8:30-9 a.m., South Main Square, 442 S. Main St. – South Main Square business networking group monthly gathering. This is a group of Davidson-based professionals who meet for fast-paced discussions, bartering, information sharing and more. RSVP: email krose@roseassociates.com to confirm your attendance (so they have enough doughnuts).

DOCUMENTS

Wholesale and Website Sales are Up from Down Economy Says Seaweed Designs

Seaweed Designs press release

Davidson, North Carolina (May 22, 2009)–Wholesale and website orders are on the increase for N.C. Manufacturer, Seaweed Designs’ brand of coastal cottage home décor and art. Sales are trending up in the second quarter according to company owner and designer, Cathy MacQueen.

“Since the Better Homes & Gardens Special Interest Magazine: Decorating, Spring 2009 issue hit newsstands and subscriber homes in early March featuring my Lily Pad table in Pool Blue, our website orders and wholesale orders and inquiries have picked up significantly, “ says Ms. MacQueen.

The pace has picked up enough that Ms. MacQueen finds she needs more time to devote to marketing and shipping wholesale and website orders. She says she also needs more time to create new designs for her twelve-year old company. She has been selling her line wholesale since 1999. Her website was launched in 2005 she opened her first retail art boutique in 2007 at 416-C South Main Street in the historic Davidson Ice and Fuel building known locally as the Davidson Icehouse.

The extra forty hours devoted to operating the retail store has divided her attention and focus and lead to occasionally posting a note on the boutique door or even closing for days. Ms. MacQueen has decided to consolidate the wholesale and retail operations to her home studio. She advised the last day for business at South Main Square would be Saturday, May 23rd.

An opportunity to lease the store to Craig Michael Photography presented itself. Ms. MacQueen said “ I can offer Mr. Dietrich custom framing for his amazing portraits. His studio will be a welcome addition to the Main Street Arts District.”

When asked what are your plans, Ms. MacQueen said she will be also expanding her white Cottage and colorful Caribbean painted frames to fit standard size photos and art. She will continue to offer traditional custom framing and matting at her Mooresville backyard studio a few miles outside of Davidson along with the coastal brand of furniture and home accents.

“With lower overhead, I plan on offering very competitive pricing on custom furniture and gifts, my white Cottage-style frames, custom framing and art supplies to local artists, portrait photographers, frame shops and anyone who wants to have a photo or treasured piece of refrigerator art matted and framed,” says Ms. MacQueen.

“I’ll miss seeing my loyal customers and want to thank everyone for supporting my boutique. I look at each experience as an opportunity to learn something new” says Ms. MacQueen. She said she has made some amazing friends as a result of the store and feels it has been a win-win situation and looks forward to organizing her business under one roof and having more time to devote to family, friends, community causes and brainstorming with local artists.

END