The Wisconsin Newspaper Association recently recognized the state’s newspapers for their exceptional work during its 2023 Better Newspaper Contest Awards Banquet. The event took place March 15 at The Madison Concourse Hotel in downtown Madison. Among the winners, Valley Sentinel came away with 17 awards.
Annually, newspapers from across the state can submit entries in the awards for editorial and advertising. Publications are divided into most categories based on circulation size and daily versus weekly publications.
The 2023 Newspapers of the Year were The (Minocqua) Lakeland Times, Weekly Division, and (Madison) Wisconsin State Journal, Daily Division.
The 2023 contest received 2,144 entries from 102 newspapers. Eligible entries were published between Sept. 1, 2022, and Aug. 31, 2023, and were judged by members of the Kentucky Press Association.
Best in Division winners were:
—Division E (non-daily circulation of 2,249 or less): Northwoods River News, Rhinelander
—Division D (non-daily circulation of 2,250 – 4,499): Superior Telegram
—Division C (non-daily circulation of at least 4,500): The Lakeland Times, Minocqua
—Division B (daily circulation of less than 9,999): EagleHerald, Marinette
—Division A (daily circulation of at least 10,000): Wisconsin State Journal, Madison
At last year’s awards, in its first year eligible, Valley Sentinel earned Best in Division E.
Out of the other Sauk, Iowa and Richland county papers, the Richland Observer (Division E) took home first place for Best Large Ad and Best Small Ad, third place for Best Multiple Advertiser Spread and honorable mentions for Best Multiple Advertiser Spread and Best Use of Art Service. Other area Wisconsin Newspaper Association member papers, the Baraboo News Republic (Division B), the Home News (Division E), the Dodgeville Chronicle (Division D), The Democrat Tribune (Division E) and the Reedsburg Independent (Division E), were not represented at the awards.
Valley Sentinel’s staff and community contributors were recognized with 17 awards. Co-Owner/Publisher/Editor-in-Chief Nicole Aimone, Co-Owner/Publisher/Managing Editor Taylor Scott, Graphic Designer Julianna Williams, Columnist Beverly Pestel and contributors Lauren Dochnahl and Don Greenwood were among those honored by name. Many more contributors lent their work to categories that were won by the paper as a whole.
Valley Sentinel’s awards include first place in the Artistic Photo (Dochnahl), Best Front Page (Valley Sentinel), Best Newspaper Promotion (Valley Sentinel) and Bill Payne Award-Best Overall Ad (Scott) categories. The publication also received second place in the Bill Payne Award-Best Overall Ad (Williams), Local Column (Aimone) and Salesperson of the Year (Scott) categories. Third place honors were awarded to Valley Sentinel in Artistic Photo (Greenwood), Best Niche Product (Scott), Best Opinion Pages (Valley Sentinel), Editorial Award (Valley Sentinel), Health Coverage (Williams, Scott) and Local Column (Pestel). Honorable mentions for Valley Sentinel were given for Best Headlines (Valley Sentinel), Best Newspaper Promotion (Valley Sentinel), Best Use of Color (Williams) and Bill Payne Award-Best Overall Ad (Scott).
“A sincere thank you again to our contributors, our readers and our community for believing in our mission of doing something different and supporting us on the journey,” said Aimone. “We couldn’t do this each edition without your support.”
The first and third place in Artistic Photo in this year’s awards echoes the newspaper’s sweep of the Artistic Photo category in last year’s awards.
“Like I’ve previously shared, a strong artistic local news photo will be that once-in-a-lifetime, breathtaking shot of a place or scene everyone in the area knows, but you were lucky enough to have a camera with you to get that shot,” said Aimone. “Traditionally it’ll include people and a snapshot of exactly what’s going on at the newsworthy event it’s reporting. What makes our entries both so interesting is they’re landscapes that don’t include people but that the community knows and resonates with—with Greenwood’s shot of the Spring Green Preserve being one of those photos that demonstrates expertise behind a camera and Dochnahl’s shot of the Octagon Barn in front of the Northern Lights showcasing a shared experience many of us had in looking up on that night.”
Of Dochnahl’s photo, the judges said: “Good capturing of the mood of the moment, which is tough to do when you’re working outside of people.”
Of Greenwood’s photo, the judges said: “This is 100% crispness. The moment itself is not incredibly unique but this photo has such incredible clarity, particularly capturing the sun being 90% in view.”
Both photos were featured on the front page cover of Valley Sentinel.
Valley Sentinel’s first place in Best Front Page came as a surprise, after the paper submitted a front page from Feb. 2022 that had an illustration that highlighted the paper’s open records and open meetings dispute with the Lone Rock Village Board, a front page from May 2023 that featured Dochnahl’s picture of the Octagon Barn and a front page from Aug. 2023 that featured the last Friday fish fry of the now-shuttered Lone Rock Bistro.
“The first two entries are unique and beautiful. But actually, the least ‘exciting’ front page—the one with the Lone Rock Bistro—is actually the best front page from a technical standpoint,” said Aimone. “The picture on the cover above the fold is framed well and newsworthy, showing a view through the front window of a waitress taking an order with an open sign in the foreground, all on their last Friday fish fry. It’s evocative. Below the fold, the technical layout of the news stories is the strongest out of all our entries.”
Scott, who lays out much of the paper, agreed.
“An area we’ve continued to tweak and improve is our front page,” said Scott. “We strive to do the hard news topically that a traditional community newspaper would, but also cover the events and arts & culture that an alternative community publication would. I wanted our front page to be reflective of that hybrid model and be attention-grabbing to residents and visitors alike.”
Last year Valley Sentinel placed third in Best Front Page amongst entries that reflected its transition at the time from a traditional front page with news “above the fold” to a community photo or illustration “above the fold”.
“I think I’ve almost got my other editor sold on the non-traditional front page,” joked Scott, of Aimone.
The judges appreciated the change in front page, noting: “LOVE how y’all are mixing up what a front page looks like. I am fascinated at the half newspaper/half magazine look of the front page, and even more so with how good it looks. Nice work!”
The first place in Best Newspaper Promotion came as a bigger surprise, with the bundles the paper put together for businesses to get out the vote and say thanks to voters for the Best of the River Valley Reader Poll getting the top nod.
“I found this one hilarious. The irony with this being awarded Best Newspaper Promotion is the advertising bundles generated no revenue this first year we offered them,” said Scott. “But we knew it was a good promotion. It was simply the first time we had offered it and we had to manage our expectations. We plan on getting out ahead of the reader poll and engaging with area businesses even more this year. It takes A LOT of time to put together, likely the most out of any of our annual endeavors, and revenue is needed to ensure we’re able to devote that time.”
Valley Sentinel’s soft launch of a Business Insider newsletter and newspaper section that offers exclusive news, first looks and advertising alerts to assist businesses in planning their marketing efforts received an honorable mention in Best Newspaper Promotion as well.
Of particular note was Scott’s second place award in Salesperson of the Year, a brand new category this year and an award that might not usually go to a traditional editor. As winners of Best in Division E at last year’s awards, Aimone and Scott were invited by the WNA to sit on a committee to help make tough decisions on what the awards would look like this year. The Salesperson of the Year category was a category suggested by Scott to recognize the hard work advertising executives and graphic designers do in making good advertising happen.
“My first job in the newspaper industry was in ad sales at a daily paper up north,” said Scott. “Many times you’d work long hours dreaming up ways to help businesses engage their community and working as a liaison and providing creative direction between passionate business owners and talented graphic designers to bring their vision to fruition.”
It was initially a joke among editors to nominate Scott.
“But then I realized that for our small volunteer group, he was the one truly doing all those things to help make advertising a success for our local businesses,” said Aimone.
Aimone also noted the first and second places as well as the honorable mention in the Bill Payne Award, which honors excellence in advertising and reflects the choices judged to be the best overall ads.
“We almost swept the category,” said Aimone. “I want to emphasize the point I’ve made before, we pride ourselves not just on our offerings to our readers, but also on our offerings to our area business community. Valley Sentinel is a free publication because we believe not only that everyone should be able to read the news, but also because of the value it offers to our local businesses whose advertisements reach that many more eyes each edition due to our accessibility.”
While some hard news entries such as coverage of Valley Sentinel’s lawsuit against the Village of Lone Rock over public records/open meetings—nominated for a Wisconsin Freedom of Information Council Openness in Government award, or Opee—and the paper’s deep dive into the audit of Arena’s clerk at her previous municipality went un-awarded amongst a very strong field of entries, there were other points of pride.
“The award I am most proud of is my second place for columns,” said Aimone. “I’m not a column writer by any stretch of the imagination—I’m most comfortable covering a county board meeting—but I felt compelled to write about my journey with Wegovy and share my experience with it (and then my loss of access to it) at a time when similarly-situated people were feeling a lot of stigma. It was cathartic and the feedback I’ve gotten back from our community was so heartening. As for the other columns I submitted, I was happy to share about how we just want to do the news well.”
Another notable area was Overall Page Design, where the judges felt so compelled by Valley Sentinel’s comprehensive community calendar that they felt it an uneven comparison to traditional news page layout and suggested the addition of a category for community calendars.
“We couldn’t win in a category that doesn’t exist,” said Scott, acknowledging that including the calendar in part was always going to be a hard sell against traditional design. “We appreciated what the judges had to say and I’m proud of all of the work that goes into making our calendar the comprehensive choice for our community to look to for events. It’s a service to the public and we hear more positive feedback about the calendar than anything else we do.”
Valley Sentinel is an independent, editor-owned, all-volunteer news publication that has been serving the Spring Green area community since October 2020, covering local news and events, meetings, arts & culture and more. This year was Valley Sentinel’s second year eligible for the WNA awards. The publication is committed to growing and providing quality journalism, while navigating and pioneering what the future of community news can look like and all the ways in which our communities can engage with it.
“We’d like to again thank our readers, contributors and our community for their support,” said Aimone. “We are truly what the community makes us and we can’t do this alone. So bring us your ideas, you never know what might win an award next year.”
To view the complete list of winners and judges’ comments, access the online version of the Better Newspaper Contest Awards Tab here. All of the awards and entries can be viewed online here. For more information about Valley Sentinel, visit www.valleysentinelnews.com/about.
