When Nadia Tolich is invited to describe ThreeNews, the 6pm TV news bulletin Stuff is producing in place of Newshub, one word comes up more than any other: “different”.
In one sense, Tolich, the managing director of Stuff Digital, is merely stating the obvious. The new bulletin can’t look like the old one: it’s produced by a different team on a tighter budget and if it tried to simply replicate the familiar 6pm TV news template, it would fail. But the structure of Stuff – and in particular its broad regional reach – will have an impact on the kind of news Three viewers will see.
“We have the strength of an enormous news pool,” says Tolich. “So [the team] working on this project is actually the entire business.”
Stuff itself is also a newspaper business, or at least an example of what newspaper businesses have become – online news organisations delivering and updating news throughout the day, rather than to daily deadlines. Its supply agreement with Three’s owner Warner Brothers Discovery brings back a hard daily deadline. Tolich doesn’t see it as a problem.
“We’ll be taking all of that news that is spread throughout the day, creating the full picture and capturing it, turning it around for the bulletin. It’s not much different than that.
“Of course providing and working towards a 6pm deadline is a little different. But our teams are used to working to different deadlines. We’ll be taking all of that news that is spread throughout the day and turning it around for the bulletin. It’s not much different than that.”
Stuff Digital has been publishing video for years and there seems to have been a push for print journalists to literally put themselves in the picture more often this year. But that’s not the same as producing pictures for for television – and that fact has generated more than a few doubts in the industry since the news deal was announced.
“We’ve actually been working really hard over the last few months in terms of finding that balance,” says Tolich. “Most people consume video in lots of different ways, on their mobile phone in particular, as we all do every day. When you look at blurry CCTV on Instagram or TikTok, we’re used to watching things that are not necessarily shiny and polished. That’s not to say that what people expect on their television screens should not be shiny and polished. Of course, it should be, it’s a big screen. But the reality is people want to just see the news, they want to see what’s happening.
“So we’ll probably take lots of what we do every day, in the styles that we do it, and you’ll see that in the bulletin. Ultimately, this is a product that we’re supplying somebody – so it’s really taking all the good stuff that you see on Stuff every day, wrapping it up and delivering it to the Warner Brothers Discovery audience.”
The word “probably” suggests that the new bulletin will be a work in progress on day one.
“The existing audience and brand lovers of WBD, and Three and Newshub, they are there and they are a valuable audience. So we don’t want this to be a cold plunge pool. We want to ensure that we meet the needs of that audience. If our audience needs aren’t met, we’re not doing our job.
“In this instance, the situation enables us to meet an entirely new audience. And there’s a bit of crossover there with Stuff. So we’ll look to complement, but the reality is, there is an expectation there that it will feel somewhat similar. But that’s why we have said from the outset, this is not about replicating at all, it’s about really innovating.”
Newshub viewers will certainly get some familiarity in the faces on screen. Samantha Hayes will front the bulletin and reporters Lisette Reymer, Jenna Lynch, Laura Tupou, Ollie Ritchie, Juliet Speedy, Zane Small, Lucy Thomson and Simon Morrow have been hired from Newshub, along with weather presenter Heather Keats. On the other side of the camera, executive producer Claire Watson and supervising producers Angus Gillies and Paul Mayow are among a group brought over from Newshub.
“But also you’ll see brilliant journalists from around New Zealand, who are in the Stuff stable,” says Tolich.
Who and how many from that stable of around 300 journalists will appear in New Zealand living rooms seems likely to be worked out over time.
“The same is evidently true of the working relationship between Stuff’s existing news channels and the new product it is producing for WBD – although the supply agreement establishes that Stuff will own the news it produces.
“We’ve been using the last few weeks as a good opportunity to think, okay, here’s this great story that we’ve covered this way for Stuff, how will we be delivering for the news?” says Tolich.
“I think that it would be foolish to think you can flick a switch and overnight it’s some sort of crazy YouTube news bulletin. That’s not what we’re trying to do here. We’re trying to ensure that, ultimately, the needs of the audience are met. And that will be a little bit of a mixture as we move towards ultimately what this becomes. We’ve all seen immense change in the industry and it’d be foolish to think that it won’t evolve. We might not know what that will evolve into at this point.
“But we are all committed honestly and truly to doing the right thing for New Zealanders and for journalism. It’s important that we use this moment wisely and really pivot towards something that is going to be long-term and sustainable.”
ThreeNews debuts on Saturday, July 6 at 6pm. The final broadcast of Newshub Live with Mike McRoberts and Samantha Hayes is on Friday, July 5.
