Village News and Southwest News Celebrates Their 35th Year
Village News and Southwest News are celebrating their 35th year as hometown, community newspapers delivered to 35,000 houses in Southwest Houston, Bellaire, West University Place and Southside Place.
The e-edition on our website is exactly the same as the one that comes to your home each week – every page, every story, every advertisement is viewable as though the newspaper was actually in your hands. You can clip interesting stories or ads and send them to friends. You can print whole pages to hang on your bulletin board. Or you can send the whole edition on to folks you think might be interested in reading the latest news from churches, schools and local governments.
"We searched for a long time to find folks who could put together a real newspaper on our website," says Kathleen Ballanfant, publisher of Village News and Southwest News."We didn't want to only list headline stories and leave out the smaller announcements about community events and people. This site will have every single thing that is included in our newspapers in a format that is a page-turning replica of Village News and Southwest News," she says.
"It will also have every single advertisement – from retail to classified – so that no customer is disenfranchised because they have an ad in the newspapers that can't be seen on the web. If you are looking for a plumber, you can turn to the classified section. If you want to find out what entertainment is available, you can turn to our Going Out section. And advertisers who have a website listed in their ads can automatically be hot-linked, so that our readers can immediately access the advertiser's site from our website," Ballanfant says.
Ballanfant started her newspaper company on June 1, 1985, the day her daughter, Andrea, graduated from Lamar High School. "Andy," as her friends know her, came to work in the newspaper offices that summer and has been part of the operation ever since. The holder of an MBA and a law degree, she is now married and has a son and daughter.
Son Ben Ballanfant was five years old when the newspapers began, and he spent nights sleeping at the office while his mom wrote stories and created ads. Now 40 and a graduate of the University of Houston, he has been responsible for working with web designers to get the new website up and going in a format that no other newspaper in our area is using.
"We were never happy with what we saw as newspaper websites," Kathleen Ballanfant says. "It especially disturbed us to know that advertisers had to purchase a separate ad in order to be seen on the web.
"Our website solves this dilemma and offers our customers added value by making their message available to anyone, anywhere, anytime."
Readers who want to sign up to have the newspaper sent directly to their computer each week can sign up on the site's home page.
News and information can be sent through hotlinks on the "contact" page, and inquiries regarding advertising can also be sent through the hotlink.
You can still reach Village News and Southwest News by calling (713) 668-9293.
But now, you can access us another way too - www.village-southwest-news.com.