 June 27, 2007, front page | |
| Type | Alternative weekly |
|---|---|
| Format | Tabloid |
| Owner | The Star Tribune Company |
| Publisher | Mary Erickson |
| Editor | Emily Cassel |
| Founded | August 1, 1979 (asSweet Potato) |
| Ceased publication | October 28, 2020 |
| Headquarters | 650 Third Ave. S. Suite 1300 Minneapolis, Minnesota 55402 United States |
| ISSN | 0744-0456 |
| Website | citypages |
City Pages was analternative newspaper serving theMinneapolis–St. Paul metropolitan area. It featurednews, film,theatre andrestaurant reviews, andmusic criticism, available free every Wednesday. It ceased publication in 2020 due to a decline in ads and revenue related to theCOVID-19 pandemic.[1][2]
On August 1, 1979, publishers Tom Bartel and Kristin Henning debutedSweet Potato, a monthly newspaper focused on theTwin Cities music scene. The first issue featured pop bandthe Cars on the cover. In October 1980,Sweet Potato went biweekly. On December 3, 1981, the newspaper went weekly and was renamedCity Pages.City Pages competed for readership with theTwin Cities Reader until 1997, when Stern Publishing purchasedCity Pages in March and theTwin Cities Reader the following day, shuttering it immediately. Bartel and Henning leftCity Pages in the fall of 1997. Tom Bartel's brother Mark was named publisher after Bartel and Henning's departure.City Pages was one of seven alternative weeklies owned by Stern, includingThe Village Voice. On October 24, 2005, New Times Media announced a deal to acquireVillage Voice Media, creating a chain of 17 (now 16) free weekly newspapers around the country with a combined circulation of 1.8 million and controlling a quarter of the weekly circulation of alternative weekly newspapers in North America. After the deal's completion,New Times took the Village Voice Media name. In September 2012, Village Voice Media executives Scott Tobias, Christine Brennan and Jeff Mars bought Village Voice Media's papers and associated web properties from its founders and formedVoice Media Group.[3]
Web editor Jeff Shaw, food columnistDara Moskowitz Grumdahl, staff writers Jonathan Kaminsky and Jeff Severns Guntzel, among others, left in 2008.[4] On May 6, 2015,City Pages was sold to Star Tribune Media Co., publisher of the Minneapolis daily newspaper of thesame name. Following the sale, Star Tribune Media Co. ceased publication of its competing publication,Vita.mn.[5]
On October 28, 2020, owner Star Tribune Media Co. said it would cease publication ofCity Pages immediately. The company said it could no longer sustain the newspaper after thecoronavirus outbreak forced closings and downsizings of the events, nightclubs, bars and restaurants that were its chief advertisers and financial base.[1]
The publication has been criticized byMinneapolis City Council memberAlondra Cano, who called a story about her "racist" and "sexist."[10] In her2015 memoir, musicianCarrie Brownstein assertedsexism in the paper's music coverage in the 1990s, citingCity Pages among "a representative sample of journalism aboutSleater-Kinney. Most of these articles are actually trying to be complementary — the authors just fell into common traps and assumptions."[11] In a 2016 interview withVice, musicianHar Mar Superstar criticized the paper for "trivializing my art by mentioning that I'm overweight and bald for no reason," saying the paper exhibited "really horrible writing and I guess bitter people."[12]
, live links to archive providers