Cyr & Knowles Breaks Ads For Sunday Paper

Unveils Campaign As Shop Searches For Creative Director To Replace Co-Founder

BOSTON: Cyr & Knowles is helping launch a Sunday newspaper in New Hampshire at the same time the 12-person shop is looking for a creative director.
Darci Knowles, whose long-term future at the agency she co-founded 10 years ago is in question, is in the midst of trying to sell her first novel, said marketing director Keith Dolan. Candidates for the position are now being interviewed, and the shop hopes to have a new creative director on board for 1998, Dolan said.
Separately, Knowles served as copywriter for a print, radio and bus-card campaign introducing Foster’s Sunday Citizen, which launched Nov. 2 and serves as the Sunday newspaper for Foster’s Daily Democrat in Dover, N.H., and the Laconia Citizen in Laconia, N.H. Karen Merk handled art direction and wrote some headlines for the effort.
Colorful ads use minimal copy to spotlight various features of the Sunday paper, including sports, travel and entertainment. The tagline: “More of what matters to you.”
One print execution features a long-haired guitarist and includes the headline, “Entertainment that doesn’t require earplugs.” Another ad advises readers to “Get a jump on all the local, national and college sports” and shows a young woman bungee jumping.
The Portsmouth, N.H.-based agency handled creative development for the campaign. The Democrat, which owns the Citizen, is handling media placement in-house. Print executions are running primarily in the two newspapers themselves.
The Democrat’s daily circulation is about 29,000; the Citizen’s is approximately 12,200, according to the Audit Bureau of Circulation. Both numbers have been flat for the past year. Figures for the Sunday startup were not available.
Audit Bureau data released last week showed a drop off in circulation numbers among some major Sunday newspapers, including The Chicago Tribune, The Washington Post and The New York Daily News.
Despite launching the paper in such an environment, Dolan said Cyr & Knowles believes its campaign can position the startup as “a good thing, one of life’s little pleasures.” Client officials did not return phone calls seeking comment.