Next week is Local Newspaper Week - organised by the Newspaper Society in association with the Prince's Trust.

It has attracted the support of HRH The Prince of Wales and Prime Minister Tony Blair. Local Newspaper Week is aimed at raising awareness of the importance of regional and local newspapers as the backbone of Britain's media and an integral part of the individual communities they serve up and down the country.

Once dismissed as the Cinderella of the media world, Britain's regional and local press has undergone a renaissance over the past three years.

Regional press news now causes excitement in the City and commands new respect among media commentators.

One of the reasons is that there is a new breed of publishers, whose regional titles are at the core of their business rather than part of an international conglomerate, and who have invested millions of pounds in new technology and the quality of their newspapers.

We are delighted to be part of this revolution. Next week we'll be telling you more about how these changes have affected the KN and what the renaissance has meant to us. Watch this space.

Converted for the new archive on 30 June 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.