Putting it on the record: get the type right

By Ed Henninger

Records copy is an important part of the content of every community newspaper. We use it in items such as police and fire reports, calendars and the like.

Without records copy, our readers would be much less informed. Yes, they’d have our stories and photos and our reports on what’s going on in the community — but they wouldn’t have information that is often crucial to day-to-day living. They wouldn’t have school lunch menus. YMCA workout listings. Support group meetings. Senior citizen health screening.

And they wouldn’t be aware of the fun stuff that’s coming up in town: Arts and crafts shows. Church ice cream socials. Summer reading programs. Garden club shows.

Most of this content is handled in the form of lists: paragraph after paragraph of tightly written items, notices and calendar events. And it needs to be given a different typographic approach because it’s not read in the same way as your stories.

Typical news stories tend to be written in a linear fashion: point b follows point a and is itself followed by point c, etc. Records and lists are organized, also—mostly by date—but the items are usually not connected in any way.

Lists and records are not “read” so much as they are skimmed. Readers tend to breeze through a half dozen or more items until they find one that interests them. Then they may skip ahead another few items, stopping again at another one that piques their interest.

So lists and records need to be given typographic treatment that makes each of them stand out from the others—while not attributing any hierarchy so that one item appears more important.

Here are some tips:

USE SANS SERIF: It helps to differentiate list copy from your standard body text.

GO FLUSH LEFT: Again, it’s different from body copy—but flush left also is more forgiving when you’ve got to list long names of groups or events.

USE A REVERSE INDENT: It’s different from text and it helps to inject some needed negative space into long columns of lists.

DON’T SKIMP ON SIZE: True, your lists may not be Pulitzer Prize caliber writing, but the content is critical to many readers. Don’t make these packages difficult to read—especially for older subscribers.

ALIGN TO A BASELINE: It makes your lists easier to read—and easier for you to place on the page.

CONSIDER EXTRA SPACING: How about putting an open line of space between the items? It makes the list even easier to skim.

CONSIDER BOLD LEAD-INS: This gives the beginning of each item just a bit more punch. It helps if you’ve started the item with a couple of words describing the event, such as: “Car show” or “Yard sale.”

CONSIDER COLUMN RULES: They can give the package a bit more support and stability.

You may not consider lists and records the most important content in your newspaper. But many of your readers would disagree—and they would want you to give that content proper display.

Records copy need not be stylish. The idea is to make it easy to skim.

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ED HENNINGER is an independent newspaper consultant and the Director of Henninger Consulting. Offering comprehensive newspaper design services including redesigns, workshops, training and evaluations. E-mail: edh@henningerconsulting.com. On the web: www.henningerconsulting.com. Phone: 803-327-3322.