The Seeker’s Year In Review

It’s been a full year.  On Wednesday, we attended the Team Cornwall Year In Review.  It is inspiring to see how much is happening in our beautiful city.  So much development is going on, so many new businesses have opened.  We wish them the best in their new endeavors.

The Seeker is all about Cornwall.  It does what Team Cornwall does once a year, every single week, 48 weeks in a row, focusing on the small entrepreneurs as well as the big developers.   We relentlessly seek the gems of the city and bring them into focus, for the whole community to see, without much, if any, city money.

We cover news, sports, arts and culture.  We promote (often times for  free) local events and happenings.  We published 1,164 stories online since February of 2013 and we donated more than $35,000 in free or reduced price advertising to non-profit organizations.  The events we sponsored amassed well over $10,000, which was directly re-injected in community organizations such as the Children’s Aid Society, SASS, Big Brothers and Big Sisters or the Boys and Girls Club to name a few.  We are a true community paper, with local content, written for Cornwall people, about Cornwall people, by Cornwall people.

The Seeker does not try to create scandals.  The Seeker chooses to show that the old news industry adage “when it bleeds, it leads” does no longer apply.  And we’re doing a mighty good job thus far.  The Seeker has been a self sufficient and self funding  venture since its onset.  Two individuals  had a dream and made it happen.  No loans, no grants, no funding were ever sought out.  We believe in being debt free, in more ways than one.

Over the last year, we have hit some major milestones, milestones worth mentioning, if not at the Team Cornwall Year in Review, certainly here in our pages.

We have completely changed our look, going from black and white to a BRIGHT red header and lots of colour, highly noticeable.  The front of our home office had a facelift.  It was painted bright red and cannot be missed.  Signage was plastered on our windows and even though our banner was knocked out by the wind a few months ago, it will soon reappear on our facade.

Our website also has had a major redesign, bringing more mainstream news and catering to a greater audience.  We consistently get between 600 and 1000 visits a day!  For the first time ever, and several times throughout the year, we ranked as the #1 online media in Cornwall according to Alexa.

Our awards ceremony grows better and bigger every year.  The 2013 event honored 9 fabulous individuals.  It was well attended, by many prominent people.  It promises to be fantastic in 2014.

We may be on our own, but we are getting harder and harder to ignore.

Moving forward, we need to remind ourselves what’s important.  We are blessed to have so many great contributors. We are lucky to have the support of our families and friends  (Thank you John, my husband, for putting up with the long hours). We are extremely thankful for you, our readers.  Your reactions, your comments, your enthusiasm over the paper is what fuels us and keeps us going.  Keep on spreading the word about this gem.  In 2014, let’s get advertisers to realize this is the best paper in town to advertise in.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year,

Julia Lucio
Editor In Chief