INN INDEX JUNE 2021 The State of Nonprofit News Rising to new challenges and public needs in a crisis year Institute for Nonprofit News | INN Index 2021 1 About the survey ABOUT THE INDEX INN distributed the survey online in January 2021 to 284 INN network newsrooms, The INN Index is the most comprehensive study of excluding service organizations that are also INN members, and 268, or 94%, the state of nonprofit news. Since 2018, the Institute completed the survey. Previous years’ for Nonprofit News has conducted this annual Index surveys were generally representative with response rates of nearly 60%. Survey survey of its nonprofit news organization members responses reflect performance in 2020. to evaluate the staffing, business models, financials, Survey language is provided here. The data do not scientifically represent all and editorial focus of newsrooms in the growing U.S. nonprofit news outlets, since not movement of public service journalism. Previous all belong to INN, including an array of Index reports are archived. public media stations. Specific year-over- year comparisons should be interpreted cautiously; this report draws directional REPORT CREDITS trends across the field. Authors: Emily Roseman, Michele McLellan, Jesse Holcomb A NOTE ON FINANCIAL DATA: The research team excluded two segments of Editor: Howard Goldberg respondents from the financial analysis Data analysis: Yejae Kim portion of this report: financial data from 24 public broadcasters, as they do not Graphic designer: Michelle D. Wise generally break out news revenue and expenses in a comparable way, and from Cover photo: Kai Tsehay, for The Fuller Project 20 startups younger than one year, as they Readers: Sue Cross, Damon Kiesow, Leslie Marable, would not have complete, comparable data. Financial reports are based on 217 Ruth McCambridge, Ashley Zohn outlets that submitted complete data. Year-over-year financial comparisons are Thank you to INN’s research advisory board for helping drawn from a smaller but significant subset Aasha Abdill (Democracy of outlets that provided complete financial guide this year’s Index Report. Fund), Nichole Dobo (The Hechinger Report), Adam Giorgi data for 2019-2020, as well as 2017-2020. (Daily Yonder), Victor Hernandez (WBUR, formerly Crosscut), Damon Kiesow (Missouri School of Journalism), Sheila Krumholz About INN (OpenSecrets), Leslie Marable (Beacon Raconteur LLC), Ruth The Institute for Nonprofit News supports McCambridge (formerly Nonprofit Quarterly), Anita Zielina and strengthens a network of more than (Craig Newmark Graduate School of Journalism), and Ashley 300 newsrooms. In partnership with our members, INN is creating a new future Zohn (Knight Foundation). for news: independent, inclusive, non- INN Index reports are made possible thanks partisan, and dedicated to public interest Our funders: rather than private profit. Our success to INN’s general support funders, including: Bernard and supports informed communities and Anne Spitzer Charitable Trust, Democracy Fund, John D. and democratic life across North America. In a Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, John S. and James L. Knight little over a decade, the INN network has Foundation, Jonathan Logan Family Foundation, Open Society grown tenfold. INN is now advancing an- Foundation, Peter and Carmen Lucia Buck Foundation, Present other cycle of tenfold growth to build an American field force of more than 20,000 Progressive Fund and Silicon Valley Community Foundation. public service journalists. Institute for Nonprofit News | INN Index 2021 2 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY In 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic, racial justice movement and presidential election intensified demand for high-quality news. The crisis year proved the value of public service journalism and accelerated the growth and public dependence on nonprofit news outlets. GEOGRAPHIC SCOPE % OF OUTLETS FOCUSING Nonprofits rose to the challenge to meet the most intense news ON ———— AFFAIRS year in a generation. Community-centered media rapidly read the GLOBAL public’s needs and ramped up coverage to provide information and 10% connections that people couldn’t find anywhere else. Journalists tackled their own field’s racism as they covered a national racial LOCAL NATIONAL reckoning. And in a polarizing election year, they provided 21% 36% nonpartisan voting guides and fact-based coverage. REGIONAL Through it all, more and more people turned to nonprofit news 9% STATE providers. Audiences swelled. So did community support for this 24% journalism. More individuals donated to newsrooms, and they donated more. Foundations also pumped funding to the field to 36+249+2110+g help with emergency coverage. This tumultuous year generated the fastest growth in nonprofit news media since the financial crisis of 2008, when many REVENUE STREAMS journalists left legacy media to create nonprofit newsrooms, % OF TOTAL REVENUE with the aim of saving accountability and investigative reporting FROM ———— considered essential to democracy. +36+143g The remarkable thing about the field’s growth in 2020 is that it FOUNDATIONS spans almost every measure. INN has been studying the field since 47% 2009, and with Index and NewsMatch data trends now going back to 2017, we also are able to see that the breadth of growth in 2020 EARNED REVENUE is part of a pattern – a steady, broad sustained growth, based on 14% INDIVIDUAL a healthy mix of revenue sources coupled with experimentation GIVING and entrepreneurship to build more. 36% The breadth of growth in 2020 accelerates the establishment of this new kind of media across the U.S. OTHER CHARITABLE 3% 47 Here’s what INN’s 2020 Index data tells us about the state of the field: • News nonprofits produce in-depth, specialized coverage. One third of the field focuses on investigative reporting, and close to 40% primarily provide deep explanatory coverage. Specialized reporting has migrated to nonprofits, many of which have become the “beat reporters” for other media. Most nonprofit newsrooms focus on one or a few related topics. This Institute for Nonprofit News | INN Index 2021 3 THE NONPROFIT NEWS in-depth coverage is generally not paywalled, but provided as DIFFERENCE: a public good. • Audiences grew and the journalism served more people. Web INN’s work in the field points traffic to nonprofit news sites grew by 43%, newsletter lists by to key differentiators that 36%. Direct audiences remain small and targeted compared characterize nonprofit journalism. with broad commercial media, but nonprofits also collaborate 1. EDITORIAL FOCUS: Nonprofit to provide coverage to millions through partners: More than newsrooms prioritize reporting 3,800 third-party outlets regularly published or aired the work of nonprofit news organizations in 2020, according to publisher that meets public needs but is estimates. challenging to produce, including specialized in-depth reporting, • Revenue grew for most outlets. Individual giving and investigative and civic work to foundation funding increases drove overall revenue growth. hold governments accountable, Nearly two-thirds of sites with comparable data saw individual giving grow, and 60% saw grant funding gains. These increases and robust, inclusive local weren’t minor. More than half of organizations with individual coverage. donation growth saw it increase by more than 50%. 2. TRUST & TRANSPARENCY: • Diverse revenue builds a stable base. More than 70% of INN Community-centric rather than member news organizations have three or more revenue shareholder-focused, nonprofit streams. Only 10% are reliant on a single revenue stream, news is nonpartisan and focuses typically grants. Earned revenue was the only source that on facts, and news nonprofits dipped in 2020. are more transparent about their • Staffing held steady, and even expanded by some measures. funding than most commercial Among established, primarily digital publications, total staffing media. was estimated at 2,700, including nearly 2,000 journalists. This 3. SUSTAINABILITY: News represents a 17% increase in total staffing from the year before. Current staffing figures are higher, as 2020 totals do not include nonprofits are highly recent startups nor hundreds of staffers at two dozen public entrepreneurial and supported media INN members. in good measure by the people they serve, making them more • Staff diversity appears to be growing. In 2020, over a third of resilient than many for-profit outlets had a staff where people of color made up 40% or more of total personnel, representative of the U.S. population. Across media. the field people of color were in 31% percent of management 4. COLLABORATION: A culture of positions and 24% of top executive leadership roles, pointing collaboration enables nonprofit toward needs to focus on retention, promotion and leadership news to share local reporting on recruitment. a national scale. Most nonprofits • The startup pace is accelerating again. A third of the nonprofit share their coverage with news outlets publishing today did not exist five years ago. commercial media, distribute Nonprofit outlets have launched at an average pace of a dozen through digital platforms and or more a year since 2008; more than 20 launched in 2020. publish without a paywall – INN’s membership grew 27% from 2019 to 2020. sharing information far beyond In the report below, we take a detailed look at this remarkable year. their own direct audiences. Institute for Nonprofit News | INN Index 2021 4 INTRODUCTION: With distinct coverage, nonprofit news advances LAUNCH YEARS Understanding