Independent Journalism Starts With Independent Support

For 26 years, Yellow Scene has remained fiercely independent.

As Boulder County and the North Metro’s only independent, locally owned news platform, we have asked difficult questions, fact-checked powerful institutions, and covered the stories shaping our communities.

Because journalism matters. Whether the story is unfolding in Washington or at your local Town Hall.

Yellow Scene remains free from quid pro quo, free from corporate ownership, and free from outside boards shaping editorial direction. We answer to our readers. That independence matters now more than ever.

But independence is not free.

Reader-driven support keeps local journalism unbought and unbossed, and our journalists fed.

Our goal is ambitious: 1,000 Sustaining Supporters by the end of summer.

Monthly support of $8, $80, $800, or $8 million gets Yellow Scene delivered to your home and strengthens independent, local journalism.

The first 50 new Sustaining Supporters will receive either a complimentary pint from Cellar West Brewery or a free pass to The Spot.

Producing honest journalism has never been easy. But keeping it independent is worth protecting.

If Yellow Scene has informed you, challenged you, made you think, or helped you better understand your community, we hope you’ll stand with us. Become a supporter today.

Journalism That Answers to Readers

The post 2026 Summer Support Drive | Journalism That Answers to Readers appeared first on Yellow Scene Magazine.

This piece is part of Yellow Scene Magazine’s Opinion section. The views expressed here are those of the author and do not represent a reported news position. At Yellow Scene, opinion pieces speak freely, challenge assumptions, and say the quiet parts out loud.

My answer to that question is YES. Yesterday, I had a local farm tell me they don’t pay for advertising except Meta. I see local shops boosting posts and paying for ads on Meta every day.

Daggers in the heart, that one stings.

Money leaves the community when it flows upward into platforms that have no stake in the survival of local economies.

Journalism didn’t die. It’s been taken over by large and powerful forces who know that when you control the airwaves, you control the policies. Over my 40 years in media, I watched journalism slowly stop being treated as a public good and start being treated like a mechanism of control. What we are seeing now with Project 2025 didn’t suddenly appear out of nowhere. The consolidation of media, attacks on education, weakening of anti-trust laws, and concentration of wealth have been building for decades.

They have had a pretty successful run. Today, most major media is controlled by six mega conglomerates with enormous billionaire influence. Schools have been defunded, anti-trust laws weakened, and we are now watching concentrated power reshape democratic institutions themselves.

Yet people still read and want high-touch experiences in their lives. Eighty-five percent of books sold are in print, and local bookstores are a rapidly growing market. Zines are in, and the analog wellness revolution is taking place.

At Yellow Scene, we use social media too. We post the articles we have published in print and online. Communities absolutely form there. But over the years we learned something important: likes don’t equal recall, and advertising metrics are often mistaken for meaningful engagement. We stopped boosting three years ago and have better engagement on stories now than before. That may be why print books, zines, local bookstores, record stores, and other human-scale experiences are resurging.

Even many successful streamers and independent news voices are proving the same point. Audiences still spend hours engaging with longform conversations, reporting, podcasts, interviews, books, and communities they trust. Social media often acts more like the messenger than the destination itself. The good ones are not succeeding because people suddenly love advertising interruptions or shallow engagement. In fact, 51% of audiences actively pay to avoid digital ads, with reports showing 93% now ignoring them altogether. Independent streamers succeed because people intentionally seek them out, trust their perspectives, and feel their time is being respected.

People did not stop consuming meaningful media. They stopped trusting media that stopped respecting them.

I recently interviewed a college intern who told me they got rid of their smartphone, switched to a flip phone, and eliminated social media entirely. Apparently, this isn’t unusual anymore.

Maybe there is just too much tech now to sort through it all?

It’s true most of us are not getting rid of our smartphones, computers, or Alexa, but what people need, since the beginning of humanity, is connection. They are finding that inside local bookstores, local farms, local music venues, and yes, local print journalism, when it offers something worth reading.

Yellow Scene’s Best of the West is just one example of authentic journalism, free from influence, while still writing about local businesses.

I do not think you will find a bigger advocate for shopping locally than the last and only locally owned news media platform serving all of Boulder County. Most other media platforms are now hedge fund-owned, corporate-owned, or franchise-operated.

We do have all the recent news nonprofit platforms starting up, some strong, but many are constrained by donor expectations to remain apolitical and nonpolarizing, avoiding the deeper “why” behind the stories.

We promote shopping local hard because we believe committing to circular economies is how we all survive the corporatization of everything by the billionaire class. Today, 75% of veterinarians and dentists are corporate-owned. This is happening to all industries, from auto repair to landscaping. Half of American homes are now owned by corporations. It used to be that 70% of businesses in America were sole proprietorships or small businesses. Today, it is down to 50%.

Local economies don’t survive on transactions alone. They survive on trust, shared information, accountability, and public participation. Local journalism is part of that infrastructure too.

At Yellow Scene, we resist that takeover.

Our press remains free. With a long 40-year career in media, I did not used to have to explain that we don’t accept quid pro quo. I did indeed drink the Seymour Hersh Kool-Aid that journalism matters. Not only are we the last locally owned publication, but we are also one of the few that do not accept sponsored content. Sponsored content is paid articles. In the old days, they said PAID ADVERTISEMENT on them, but not anymore. They are simply published as if they are independent journalism. Most people figure it out, though. When you have a full-page story on an insurance broker, it becomes obvious. Where it hits the slippery slope is when political organizations buy it while it’s presented as an actual article.

I won’t do it. I will quit before I do. I am committed to local journalism more than ever, even if it is not the pathway to riches. I think we have a lot more in common with our small local businesses than giant behemoths.

Sponsored content is a disservice to everyone, and I can’t believe after 40 years that this is what I am fighting. Not who does the better journalism, but who is still doing actual journalism. I’ve been doing this too long to spend my time putting out advertorials just to survive. We are focused on making something people actually want to read and, critically, coverage that is free of monetary influence.

That does not mean advertising itself is evil. It’s only evil if you do evil things with it. But there should be a clear line between what is editorial coverage and what is advertising, and respect should be given when people say they do not want advertising tracking them everywhere they go.

We happily help local businesses design advertisements that tell their stories in authentic and creative ways. One of the benefits of print is that advertisements exist alongside the reading experience instead of constantly interrupting it. Readers know what an ad is, and good ads can still add personality, discovery, and texture to the pages. Local businesses help make up our local community, and people often appreciate their print ads. The good streamers and independent media voices understand this too. They keep advertising separate from their coverage, or their audiences support them directly so they do not have to rely heavily on ads at all.

Do local businesses and organizations get coverage in Yellow Scene? All the time, but not for money.

We think the work local-owned shops are doing is important too. If people want to fight back against the corporate takeover of everything, shop local.

But to provide a free press, we still have to pay our writers, artists, printers, mailing costs, and drivers to produce, print, distribute, and deliver 25,000 copies filled with award-winning journalism. We understand our local organizations’ plight, as we operate on slim margins too.

Maybe Meta is less the problem than the symptom of a very confusing advertising world. For the last 20 years, small businesses have been told print was dead, digital was the future, and journalism was going by the wayside. Somewhere along the line, likes and analytics became mistaken for meaningful engagement.

But journalism will never die. There will always be truth tellers in this world. Sometimes people just want to sit down and read something worth their time, and that they can trust.

If communities want independent journalism free from corporate or political influence, they have to participate in the same circular economy they advocate for when they say “shop local.”

People are searching for real connection more than ever in a world increasingly shaped by algorithms, corporate consolidation, and manufactured engagement.

In today’s corporate world, finding true, honest journalism is getting harder, and that includes local news, too. From corporate takeovers to the nonprofit industry, finding reporters willing to ask the hard questions seems like a thing of the past.

Which is why Yellow Scene remains fiercely independent and never, ever accepts quid pro quo. We are only beholden to our readers, not funders.

The truth is, we really cannot do this without you. If you value our journalism, become a sustaining supporter for $8 a month. Your support keeps honest reporting alive and gets the hard copy delivered to your home.

The post Is local media part of the circular economy eco-system? appeared first on Yellow Scene Magazine.

This piece is part of Yellow Scene Magazine’s Opinion section. The views expressed here are those of the author and do not represent a reported news position. At Yellow Scene, opinion pieces speak freely, challenge assumptions, and say the quiet parts out loud.

I love you. I really do. And I say that with all sincerity. Nobody champions local more than we do. We believe it is as close to a circular economy as we can get. We believe small businesses aren’t trying to bribe their elected officials. And we believe if you want to BDS, there is an easy fix: shop local.

I often joke that no one in their right mind stays in local journalism. I am a dynamo salesperson, an elite, a rainmaker. I could have left the field to make more money, but I didn’t. And the reasons have only compounded the longer I stay in local journalism and observe our world.

I got my first media job at the age of 21 and fell in love. I got my start in the sales department as an art college dropout. With zero training, knowledge, or experience, I landed a position where they gave me all the leads that never advertised and told me if I could sell them, I could keep my job.

So 21-year-old me, happy-go-lucky and extremely ADHD (I like to spell it Adhhhd), walks into the door of my first lead with the Christmas Guide I was supposed to sell. Promptly, the lady tells me to bugger off—she doesn’t want any.

Not knowing how the industry worked, obviously, I didn’t know what to say or do. So I went home and hand-sketched an idea for her. It was clever and funny, and different. Now, in hindsight, I am grateful I didn’t know that my industry didn’t help you with these things. So I carefully worked the concept out, even hand-lettering it.

Taking it back the next day, I told her I had an idea and held it up for her to see. She proclaimed no one had ever done something like that for her. She liked it, and she bought it. I fell in love. The idea that I could use my art skills to help hard-working business owners was deeply enriching. My career was born.

At this crossroads in America’s history, each of us has a decision to make about who we are supporting and why.

I have always worked in independent media. I was shaped by some brilliant journalists who poured the Kool-Aid down my throat: the 4th estate, the watchdogs, and the idea that democracy needs a free press.

Attorney Matt Simonsen (left) presents Yellow Scene’s argument to Court of Appeals judges (left to right) Stephanie Dunn, Gilbert Román and Craig Welling. (Credit: John Eisele, Colorado State University)

Recently, Yellow Scene appeared at a Court of Appeals hearing in Fort Collins at CSU in our case with the City of Boulder over police transparency. It’s a big deal and could set a state precedent. It’s also scary. But I am proud that we did it, as holding truth to power really does matter to us.

Corporatization is not just impacting journalism. Today roughly 90% of news media is owned by just a small handful of conglomerates. With the Ellisons expanding their control over more major media platforms, the ownership pool has shrunk even smaller. There is no doubt corporatization has had negative impacts on the United States’ democratic process, influencing policies that enrich a small few while consolidating power.

Corporatization is also coming for small business. Today, roughly 70% of vets and dentists are owned by corporate conglomerates. Other industries are seeing this as well—from mechanics and daycare centers to food sources, banks, and medical practices—all being gobbled up and consolidated.

Yet roughly 50% of businesses in America are still owned by a sole proprietor, a number that has declined 20% or more over the past two decades. It is a wonder we have them left, and we should be doing everything we can to protect them.

Downtown Louisville, CO

This is true for local business choices as well. As the last and only locally owned, independent news platform left serving all of Boulder County, you can imagine our frustration when we see our small business owners handing their advertising dollars to Meta.

I love our small business owners, but most are not masters of marketing. Too often it’s treated like the red-headed stepchild. I see folks jump from one shiny bandwagon to the next with less than 1% allocated to marketing, treating it like an expense instead of an investment, with messages that are dry, boring, and cookie-cutter, only to hear them say, “advertising doesn’t work.”

They are right. When approached that way, it doesn’t work. That is why we provide our Marketing Guidebook and Growth Objective Calculator, to help with crafting a strategy. It is also why we offer agency-quality copywriting and design, so the message has meaning instead of just telling people they exist.

But uttering the tired old line “print is dead” is lazy thinking as well. That was a sales pitch from the tech bros to convince business owners to give them all their money. Funny thing: 25 years after the tech revolution, we are so saturated that people are paying not to see online ads, and if they don’t, 86% have “banner blindness.”

Until AI starts spending money in the marketplace, we still need humans. Hopefully, we want a society where all humans can thrive, not just survive.

There is a reason we never gave up print. First, we didn’t buy that print was dead. Book sales only decreased for a few years, and it was about a 5% decrease. Today, books are on the rise. Additionally, e-books only capture about 15% of the sales.

Why would people prefer print over digital? Lots of reasons, but let’s start with the fact that human beings need connections. That is a biological fact. In fact, the more digital that is thrown at us, the more people burn out on it and start to seek authentic connections. Also, fun fact: we retain 7x more information from print than digital, so give your kids books—not tablets.

Yes, we have lots of online coverage, and our website is seen even more than our social media. But we have also learned that a surefire way to have a failed event is to only rely on social media. It takes nothing to like something and move on.

Yellow Scene has been committed to producing authentic journalism since we started. We are very proud of the stories we cover for the community on shoestring budgets. We could have more money if we accepted “sponsored content,” something a vast majority of platforms have taken to publishing. We won’t.

I am sorry, but a story about a realtor or insurance salesperson isn’t a feature. It’s called vanity marketing for a reason. It’s a disservice to democracy, to the advertiser, and to the reader.

And frankly, readers don’t go home on Friday night and watch infomercials. They watch well-produced shows. I can hear the conversations: “Hey, have you seen the latest infomercial? It’s got me on the edge of my seat!”

That’s exactly why we’ve never accepted pay-to-play articles at Yellow Scene. We have never taken money to write about any subject. Our calendar is free, press releases are free, and our journalists are free from influence. So if we wrote about you, it is because you had a story to share. Yellow Scene truly is your authentic local free press.

I have been in journalism my entire life; I am not going to start doing quid pro quo now. The struggles we face aren’t from not being able to get readers. We have a 97% pickup rate in stands and 75,000–100,000 views a month on the website.

After 25 years sustained by advertising, part of our work is helping small businesses understand that content is king, that local media serves the local community, that the latest fad is just that—a fad, and that we would rather help them craft strategies that incorporate a full-funnel approach. We work our asses off for our small businesses and love doing so.

But it sure would be nice if they stopped jumping on bandwagons and giving their money to all the tech-lords.

I started this work as a 21-year-old art school dropout, sketching ideas for small businesses. Four decades later, I still believe the same thing: when local businesses and local media support each other, communities thrive, and yes, people still read.

In the meantime, to remain truly free from corporate influence, we are moving to a sustaining supporter model. Yes, similar to NPR. In today’s world of corporate consolidation, advertising alone is no longer enough, and we have no interest in answering to a board. Being reader-supported means the only people we answer to are our community.

Whether you are a small business owner or a reader, if you value having one locally-owned platform committed to journalism standards in your backyard, supporting local media is a meaningful way to participate in local democracy.

Just $8 a month gets it delivered to your house and helps keep local journalism thriving.

And for the local business owners I care so much about, local media reaches the local community with more impact and for far less than digital advertising.

The post An Open Letter to Our Local Community, Including the Local Businesses That Serve It appeared first on Yellow Scene Magazine.

Storyshare provided by Corey Hutchins, Inside the News in Colorado. Coverage is free today, but if you enjoyed this post, you can tell Inside the News in Colorado that their writing is valuable by pledging a future subscription. Find Inside the News on Substack

The parent company of multiple local TV news stations in Colorado is fighting back against a hostile takeover bid from a conservative rival.

This week, E.W. Scripps, which owns Denver7 and KOAA News5 in Colorado Springs, rejected an aggressive offer by Sinclair Broadcast Group to buy the company.

Adam Symson, the president and CEO of Scripps, emailed his staff on Tuesday about the latest development in the Trump-era TV merger wars.

“Our board unanimously decided to reject the proposal as the board determined, after careful review, that Sinclair’s offer was not in the best interests of Scripps and our shareholders as well as our employees and the many communities and audiences we serve across the United States,” he wrote, according to an email obtained by this newsletter.

Employees at Denver7 and KOAA News5 might breathe a little easier — at least for now.

“This news has no impact on your day-to-day work, and we remain focused on executing our strategy,” their CEO told them. “It’s business as usual at Scripps, and our audiences, customers and communities expect the same high level of service we’ve always provided.”

In a statement on its website, Sinclair offered this:

“We are disappointed that despite Scripps encouraging Sinclair to make a proposal, Scripps’ board rejected the proposal without engaging. Our proposal was based on previous discussions and was responsive to concerns about Scripps’ communities, employees and shareholders. It delivers significant strategic and financial benefits for both companies and all shareholders and represents a substantial premium over both Scripps’ unaffected and current share price. We call on Scripps to engage with us regarding our proposal. We believe Scripps’ shareholders deserve a full and fair evaluation of this opportunity.”

As this newsletter reported earlier this month, Sinclair’s attempt to gobble up Scripps would have given the conservative broadcaster its first foothold in Colorado. If successful, it would also turn Sinclair into a local broadcasting behemoth with some 240 stations nationwide.

In some cities, like Milwaukee, Cincinnati, and Detroit, news of Sinclair’s attempt to take over a local TV station made headlines.

Here in Colorado, the news didn’t make it much further than national wire reports despite its potential to drastically shakeup the local TV news landscape in at least two of the state’s largest cities. That’s in contrast to a different TV takeover currently in the works that is closer to reality.

Nexstar, which owns KDVR Fox31, is in a public comment period for its planned purchase of Tegna, which owns Denver’s 9NEWS.

Some of Colorado’s top Democratic leaders — as well as one of the state’s most outspoken and influential conservatives — have thrown serious shade on the deal, saying it would be bad for the state’s residents.

Colorado’s Democratic attorney general, Phil Weiser, who is running for governor, has promised to “closely review this proposed merger to determine if it will harm Coloradans.”

This newsletter is proudly sponsored by The Colorado Health Foundation. As a proud funder of Colorado Media Project, the home of Press Forward Colorado, the CHF understands that healthy communities need a healthy news ecosystem.

This year, The Colorado Health Foundation will be working to combat disinformation and misinformation, and helping nonprofits build media literacy.

The post Colorado TV news owner slaps down bid by conservative Sinclair broadcast giant appeared first on Yellow Scene Magazine.

When I graduated from CSU with a degree in Journalism, I was ready to fight the man.

However, I was required to take only a few newswriting and journalism classes; my schedule was filled with content creation, web design and SEO. I understand why. My instructors had a duty to offer their undergrads a future, and journalism looked bleak due to corporatization, so these other courses were pushed. 

While working my way through college as a cook, I knew I wanted more. I loved cooking because I loved being of service, but I wanted to have a bigger impact on my community.

Armed with my university experience, I dived into the marketplace with one thing on my mind: “How am I going to help people and solve problems?”

The #1 problem I came across was marketing, specifically digital marketing.

I’m 26 now, which means I grew up with YouTubers rising from obscurity to millionaires, Blockbuster shuttering its doors, and Netflix still mailing discs. Every place that hired me wanted more “me’s.” They wanted cool looking Zillenials engaging with their brand, and believed I was the one to bring them. They also believed the only thing people my age did was look at their phones. 

All I had to do was entice people to like me. Easy right? I started promoting all the socials, building demographic models to target, and crafting digital strategies. We had a sizable marketing budget, and I was given the authority to do what I thought would work best. And then came the dreaded marketing meetings…

I would wake up in the middle of the night, feeling sick before going to work, and damn-near crying before I opened the door to the conference room. You can always make a graph look good —move the data just enough to make it look like you were doing a good job, use pretty colors to distract from the abysmal performance —but that wasn’t me. I was there to solve problems.

This is how a usual meeting would go: “We got 50,000 impressions targeting 25-40 year olds residing in Boulder County. From those 50,000 impressions, we got 100 clicks. From those 100 clicks, we got 20 unique visitors. And now, from those 20 unique visitors, we got 4 conversions. That has resulted in 1 sale, leaving those other 3 conversions in the checkout.” Marketing meetings became public flagellations.

That’s one of the reasons I left digital marketing. All the strategies I was taught, along with all the tools I knew how to use, still didn’t solve any problems for the people I was supposed to be helping. In fact, I often felt I was ripping them off.

With the resurgence of vinyl records, romance novels, and… Funko Pops it’s clear my generation has no desire for digital real estate (remember the metaverse? NFTs?) We have been drowning in digital saturation since we were born. With our understanding of how social media affects mental health there has been a huge shift to more ‘traditional’ technologies from flip phones to record players.

Ever since Snowden blew the whistle on how the NSA and online businesses are spying on us, I have taken measures to not be trackable. I take great pride in how Google sees me due to my online habits. I get ads for mobile games that are definitely geared towards toddlers; I get ads to vote Democratic and Republican; and I get ads for menopause and ED medication. If my online presence were a dating profile, it would have 0% compatibility.

We are human. We are not just like you, but we are not that different. We both mute the TV when ads start playing. We are not happy about having to settle for a subscription with ads. We are not data points. 

Like everyone else, my generation values authenticity, but we’ll settle for entertainment. My boss uses this quote when talking about establishing your position in the marketplace: “Be there first. If you can’t, find a niche. Neither of the first two matters if no one has heard of you.”

The Confession: Why I left Digital for Print

1. I graduated with a degree in Jargon. 

It pains me to say this, but other than the copywriting, I could have gained all my skills from YouTube videos instead of going to college. Instead, I was taught jargon. Whenever you hear someone say “KPIs, Conversion Rates, PPC Sales,” or “SEM” — run. Every time I thought I was losing a job interview, I would use one of these terms and have the interviewer back on my side. 

One of the misguided lines I heard recently is, “You know the Purchase Funnel is dead, right?” I’ve seen every kind of shape used to describe the psychology of the buyer, from triangles to pentagrams. If your marketing person can’t explain marketing in layman’s terms, fire them.

2. Audience vs. Demographics

The common misconception about digital marketing is that it is mass media. The difference is that digital marketing relies on a demographic while mass media relies on an audience. Yellow Scene Magazine, for example, has curated a strong audience of Boulder County residents because we publish content that people in Boulder County want to engage with. A demographic is a selection of people who engage with certain content. Instead of advertising where the eyeballs are, digital marketing advertises where the eyeballs hope them to be. 

Digital marketing is perfect for accomplishing a few certain tasks. You should be good enough with SEO that you are on the first page of search results (although, truth be told, it doesn’t matter if you’re the first one anymore). With sponsored listings and AI distractions, most clicks usually end up at the third or fourth listing. However, when businesses only use digital to fulfill their direct and mass media marketing, they are shrinking their Purchase Funnel. Those 50,000 impressions to two or three clicks are more of a sieve than a funnel. 

Saying the Purchase Funnel is dead is ridiculous because it’s introductory human psychology. Have we got your Attention and Interest? Because I know you won’t make a Decision to Act without those. Mass media influences the later stages of the buying process. Direct Marketing (like digital) influences as they are ready to buy, and your own business is what keeps them coming back. Maybe the term for the Purchase Funnel is some clever new tech jargon, but people are still people. The principle is the same.

3. Praise be to the glorious Purchase Funnel!

Marketing is a communication tool, not magic.  It is only evil if you do evil things with it.

However, the biggest thing I have learned is the omnipresence of the purchase funnel, much like the Golden Ratio or the 80/20 Rule. These are mathematical formulas that describe consistent behavior that are backed by centuries of research. Humans have been trying to crack our brains to see what makes us tick since our inception. Now we have a pretty good summation of what makes humans decide. 

It takes millions of years for a species to evolve. My generation does not have any different brain capacity than my Boomer counterparts, which means while our preferences may differ, our psychology does not.

I remember on my first day here at YS, my publisher showed me a scene from the movie Glenn, Gary, Glenn Ross. “A! I! D! A! Attention! Interest! Decision! Action!” Alec Baldwin shouts. 

If someone is straying from these four principles, they are trying to TRICK YOU. I’m not being facetious. There are people out there who are happy to take your money while you shout into a black hole, and I used to be one of them.

Why I Chose Print: 

I think digital marketing has a place, but far too many are doing evil things with it, and frankly, there is just way too much of it for anyone to pay attention to. Social Media is a useful tool for reaching your existing clientele. It’s a way to show appreciation for those who bothered to follow you. And if you have all the business you need from Google, there is no point in advertising. But most don’t, and print has a power that digital does not. 

A Berkeley study shows that we retain seven times as much information from print as from digital. It’s a nice break from the screen (when it’s interesting). It has the power to inform, change minds, and showcase the community. I also don’t have to jump through hoops to make sure I am not being tracked. Digital can do this as well; however, with the invention of algorithms and digital echo chambers, people find what they want to see. That makes it much harder to cut through the noise and reach the customer. Print forces the audience to slow down and consume, instead of constantly changing the channel. And a funny thing, we trust what we see in print 90% more than online.

I chose a platform that does authentic journalism and still prints so that I could sleep at night. I feel great pride in the authentic service we provide to the community, which includes local businesses. KPIs like clicks, scrolls, and conversions give us dopamine, but they rarely lead to results. Don’t be fooled by the instant gratification; if you want a long-term business, you need a long-term strategy.

I also know I am too young to “know-it-all,” but my tenure at Yellow Scene lets me at least say that I’m a problem solver, not a jargon-talking, hipster here to grift anyone.

#LocalJournalismIsAPublicGood Become a sustaining supporter and keep local, independent journalism strong.

Democracy needs journalism more than ever. We’ve been telling the truth for 24 years. Your support helps us keep telling it for at least the next four years.

The post Confessions of a Digital Marketing Manager appeared first on Yellow Scene Magazine.

Brad Feld has been a leading figure in the startup community for over 15 years. After seeing his own share of successes and misses, Feld has a very comprehensive understanding of what makes a good startup ecosystem work.

The Boulder-based Feld is now sharing those insights in his new book Give First: The Power of Mentorship.

“I’ve been thinking about this for a while,” Feld, the co-founder of the venture capital firms Foundry Group and Mobius Venture Capital, and the business Techstars said.

Feld said “The concept of ‘Give First’ was actually something that first appeared in a book I wrote in 2012 (Startup Communities).”

That construct is centered around how to build “long-term, powerful startup communities by putting energy into a system without defining upfront what you’re going to get back.” Or to put it another way, “it’s the idea of giving before you get. ”

He is quick to point out that the ideas in Give First “are a philosophy, not a religion.” It is not simply pure altruism either. Giving First as a base concept is about taking a situation that has traditionally been very direct and looking at it in a completely different way. 

While Feld has been working over these concepts for almost a decade, he indicated that the current business environment provided a push to codify them in print. “In this moment in time we have a culture, in both business and politically, that is extremely transactional. One where I would suggest that you find a clear winner and a clear loser in even simple scenarios.”

A Selfish System

Entrepreneur Brad Feld

“This book offers a different way to approach systems, it’s very different then what we are seeing modeled day in and day out,” Feld said. 

 He explains the basic concept as “You can’t say if I do A and then B and then C, I’ll get to D. That’s because what happens is you do A and it generates Q and then Q becomes the input into the thing where the output is 27.” When Giving First you worry more about what’s happening in the moment and less about getting to D. This approach also in many ways creates a level playing field for startups. In Giving First, the privileged aren’t working to exclusively connect and mentor the privileged because there is a longer-term outlook to the relationship. Benefits will develop, but they won’t often be immediate. Under this outlook Feld admits that at its core “Give First can be fundamentally selfish.” 

The goal is to use this philosophy to create a “relationship dynamic.” 

“One thing I really wanted to bring out was that in business, particularly in startups, the mentor and mentee can both benefit from the relationship” Feld said. “It should be a positive sum experience.”

The Boulder Thesis

“I believe you should be able to build a startup anywhere in the world and today we’re seeing that happen. Every startup community and geography is defined by the area where it is located,” Feld said. “I didn’t move to Boulder to be in New York City, I moved to Boulder because I wanted to be part of Boulder.”

After being involved in startup communities around the country, Feld began to notice patterns directing why some saw more streamlined success while others were rife with churn. He classified these tenets for success in The Boulder Thesis, named after the thriving startup community in his own backyard.

In the Boulder Thesis, Feld states that a strong startup ecosystem needs  “Founders who will lead. A long-term view of at least 20 years. An inclusive, welcoming environment that includes anyone who wants to participate. Activities and events that foster engagement and collaboration.” And he ties all of this directly into the concepts in Give First. “If you want to get things moving in your startup community, all of the founders have to be willing to put energy into the community without defining upfront what they’re going to get out of it.”

The Give First concept has relevance not just to the world of venture capital, but to other businesses, organizations, and even individual actions as well. “You want to get something out of an interaction,” Feld admits, “but you just never know when, from whom, over what time period or what other considerations may come into play.”

Feld says that it’s important to remember that part of this process, of any process, is failure. “Doing anything new is just a series of experiments. You have a hypothesis, you run an experiment. Most of the time the experiment fails. But the key is to learn something from what happened, change your hypothesis and then run the experiment again.”

It hit hard when, after 31 years, a beloved local publication closed its doors. Independent journalism in Colorado just got a little smaller. And a lot more vulnerable.

In Boulder County, only one locally-owned, independent news platform remains: Yellow Scene Magazine. We don’t answer to a corporate board. We’re not backed by a hedge fund. We answer and report to our readers..

The future isn’t found in selling out or corporate donors. It’s in community.

Help us keep unbought, unbossed journalism alive and delivered to your mailbox.

Become a sustaining supporter for just $8/month:

Democracy needs journalism more than ever. We’ve been telling the truth for 24 years. Your support helps us keep telling it for at least the next four years.

The post ‘Give First’: A Boulder Entrepreneur’s Philosophy for Success appeared first on Yellow Scene Magazine.

You know that feeling when you’ve been in a relationship with a dreamy, charismatic billionaire, only to realize they’re actually an empty shell of a human being—and extremely toxic?

Maybe that’s how Americans felt today. But let’s be real—many saw the toxicity long before the breakup. The relationship with America is over, Elon. You blew it. She doesn’t want you back.

Tesla Takedown, Superior CO, March 1, 2025, photo credit: BlueSky: Jose-Luis Jimenez

Hundreds gathered in Superior, Colorado, at the Tesla dealership today for the national #TeslaTakedown protest, and the message was loud and clear. Instead of backlash, protesters were met with cheers and supportive honks from passersby, proving just how many people are ready to say goodbye.

The protest remained peaceful, even joyful, as demonstrators sent a message to the world’s most infamous narcissist: It’s over.

BlueSky Post

The so-called Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), led by Elon Musk, has initiated mass layoffs, over 200,000 federal employees across various federal agencies. Notably, the Department of the Interior saw 2,300 employees dismissed, including 1,000 from the National Park Service, the Department of Homeland Security, which oversees FEMA, has cut 405 employees, with the majority coming from FEMA, while the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) lost 388 staff members. These abrupt firings have sparked widespread concern about their legality and impact.

Trump orders more layoffs, Musk touts cuts at cabinet meeting – Reuters

We all suffer from federal workforce cuts – Southern Environmental Law Center

As The Hill puts it, Congress needs to put DOGE in a time-out. Marshall Ramsey’s editorial cartoon, “Sorry, Sir,” nails it—Air Force One soars as figures parachute out, with a speech bubble reading, “Sorry, sir, DOGE accidentally fired all the pilots.” It’s a sharp jab at Musk’s reckless mass firings, but the reality isn’t so funny. It’s not just federal workers being tossed out—it’s a gut punch to the entire economy. With key agencies gutted, industries disrupted, and consumer confidence shaken, we’re all in freefall. The question is: Who’s left to land the plane?

Tesla Dealership, March 1, 2025, photo credit: Jose-Luis Jimenez_Blue-Sky

When it feels like there’s nothing left to do, remember—your economic power is great. Get involved.

Tesla Takedown Movement motto:
• Sell Your Tesla
• Dump Your Stock
• Stop Musk Now!

Learn more: www.teslatakedown.com, or on BlueSky, or Facebook. We pretty much quit X, so if you are on X, you know how to find it.

We strongly encourage shopping locally at times like this.

Find additional resources at yellowscene.com:

How to Decorporatize Your Groceries

Ethics Are Alive and Well in America’s Small Business Community: 25 Businesses that are 25 Years or Older

Best of the West 2025

Get more Tesla Takedown News here on Blue Sky. You can also find Tesla Takedown coverage by local documentary photographer Chris Goodwin of desrowVISUALS.

photo credit:
ChrisGoodwin/desrowVISUALS

Like journalism like this? Consider becoming a sustaining supporter (and get our printed copy monthly at home.)

Democracy needs journalism more than ever. We’ve been telling the truth for 25 years. Your support helps us keep telling it for at least the next four more.

Democracy needs journalism more than ever. We’ve been telling the truth for 24 years. Your support helps us keep telling it for at least the next four years.

The post Tesla Takedown Hits Superior, CO as Nationwide Movement Kicks Off – March 1, 2025 appeared first on Yellow Scene Magazine.

Beloved LGBTQIA+ hub and craft distillery Deviant Spirits, better known as DV8, has locked the doors of its tasting room in Boulder for now. While the space is not currently open to the public, the venue’s flagship product known as “Sparkle” a colorful fruit punch flavored vodka-based liqueur filled with edible glitter, is still under production.

Known for its avant-garde and inclusive atmosphere, DV8 means more to the community than just another distillery. A safe haven for marginalized communities, the venue has hosted a diverse selection of events from sultry raves, art installations, comedy shows, and drag performances in addition to providing an incubator for musicians from its own Battle of The Bands events, to the record-breaking LunaFest ’24 festival held this past April. 

DV8 is a sanctuary where anyone can be themselves without judgment or hatred, and a place that forges a fruitful bouquet of both friendships and collaborations. The closure of the venue, hopefully only temporary, has affected many who find solace within its walls. While the community mourns the loss of the tasting room, the spirit of DV8 lives on through both its devoted patrons and the sparkle that it left in both the hearts of its family and the shelves of liquor stores across the nation, regardless of the future of the tasting room.

The post DV8 Distillery Temporarily Closes Tasting Room, Focuses on Distribution appeared first on Yellow Scene Magazine.

I hate selling advertising. Well, I don’t really; I actually love my job. I have done this work for over three decades. I love the countless businesses that have believed in our work and have supported us for 24 years. I just hate arguing with others about how advertising works. 

I do love helping my customers make it work better. I love love, love when someone tells me how much it sucks, but then they let me help them with a creative design and a thought-out plan, and a year later, their business is more where they want it. That is the best. 

I just wish I could do that without having to argue that 1% is not an adequate budget, Instagram is not a whole “strategy,” or print has died. Just because the Tech Bros said so doesn’t mean it’s true. In fact, many brands are returning to direct mail in 2024. We just got new research: 86% of people have banner blindness. You have greater odds of surviving an airplane crash than someone clicking on your banner ad. Ouch! Which begs the question, How many of your customers even saw it? At least print ads aren’t offensive.

After all these years in the business, I can see why it’s not working for folks now or even 30 years ago. The approach to advertising should serve a purpose. You really do want to know who you are reaching, which means analyzing beyond the name, paper stock, and price. Research who the audience is before signing on the dotted line. Impulse buys (unless there is a slush fund) can have negative impacts as well. Up/down/up again/down again can increase without a strategic marketing plan.

In 1922, a business leader coined the famous term,

“Half the money I spend on advertising is wasted, how do I know which half?”

Social Media Averages

This is where the challenges of talking to businesses about advertising come in. There is no single way to prove which advertisement is “making the sale.” The fact is none are, and they all are. People buy from people they trust. It is a question of where they see you. Coupons are not really an ideal measurement tool, which I mentioned in my last article, Let’s Talk Dirty.

One of the ways I see people go wrong in their marketing approach is an either/or attitude. This approach completely misses the purpose of advertising, which is to reach an audience and realize a growth objective. After 30 years, I swear some folks approach it, intending to spend as little as possible and just being done with it rather than use a multi-tiered analytic approach.  Spray & Pray Marketing is the opposite of strategic.

How to Get Your Brand Out of the Graveyard.

It’s not fun arguing about that with people, though. Personally, I would rather talk to you about how to build trust in the community (there are so many positive ways, some smaller reach and some larger reach) and how to implement Internal, Direct, and Mass strategies in the Purchase Funnel to develop A.I.D.A. (Attention, Interest, Decision, Action) and how that impacts your long-term business. I would rather talk about knowing the audience and what interests people in your local business. I would also rather talk about how companies that maintain steady marketing (based on a budget of 3-5%) in all stages of the Purchase Funnel hold steadier sales in downturn economies and have less radical ups and downs. I would rather put my talent to use and help you craft an interesting, engaging message that is appealing to the person seeing it versus trying to convince you that running a giant business card with a pretty picture is what you need (it isn’t). And, I don’t think the social media intern should be making the marketing decisions.

When we call folks to talk about their business marketing, we’re not calling to “bug” them. We call because we know that approximately 8,000 homes are sold yearly in Boulder County, 2,000 alone in Erie. We know this market grew from 150,000 people in 1990; today, it is nearly 450,000. We know when new people move in, they don’t know anything about their area, and they get Yellow Scene Magazine in the mail or see it in stands – they use it. I know they read it because they tell me, but I can also see all the copies picked up. Just like when someone gets written about and how excited they are by the feedback. It’s read by a good number of our community, and I don’t want to argue about that either. 

We greet them in this community in a welcoming and informed way. We are not “data-mining” our followers. Just one of the problems with data mining is that large companies are now fixing prices based on purchase history. David Dayen-Majority-Report_June-04-2024. I am not sure that model is great for long-term loyalty. I guess if the goal is to screw over the customers to get rich, it’s a good model. Which is one of the reasons I am so pro-local business.

People don’t just learn about their new community through our stories; they also learn about the businesses in this community. I also know that 50% of new businesses are gone in 5 years, and often, I can tell you why. I can also typically pinpoint what they are doing to be successful. Granted, advertising is one part of that, but they have growth initiatives laid out as a succinct plan. They made choices on who they thought the audience was first. 

Everyone loves YS free press. We rarely have to chase down an interview. But advertising, oh boy, I might as well not exist. Yet advertising is neither evil nor a magical cure. Bouncing from platform to platform that’s trending, whether it was Groupon or Yelp,  this magazine or that magazine, this social media or that social media is one of the biggest culprits to frustrations businesses experience in their marketing. In perspective, 20 years ago, cable was the hottest thing for businesses to jump on. Moving the same 1% around from platform to platform is not a strategy. Those are tools you use in your tool bag, but the marketing strategy is reaching the community in all stages of the purchase funnel and, ultimately, the impression they have of you. 

I provide the Growth Objective Calculator, a tool I picked up over the years. It uses math and a series of questions to help you figure out where you are, where you want to be, and what it takes to get there. There is even a tab for laying out the strategy and the budget (it’s more successful if you set a budget of 3-5%). It’s the same type of tools that agencies use. I give it away for free. I will even show you how to use it for free. Of course, I think YS should be part of the mix, but I will still give advice on other options because I know local sources for other parts of your purchase funnel.  I support many of our local organizations, and we are lucky to have both the Longmont Chamber of Commerce and the Boulder Chamber doing exceptional work for local businesses to partner with. 

Newcomers and long-time residents alike appreciate YS. They look forward to our articles, which are interesting and informative, but they also grow to trust the businesses they see advertising to them. You’re part of the community. Back in California, when I first started in media in Santa Cruz, this pizza place was called ‘A Pizza My Heart.’ It had this Janis Joplin/R Crumb-style comic art. It was awesome, and everybody loved it. That is how your advertising tells a story and creates connections. Be interesting! Yet, 70% of ads running across platforms are boring. (Not Yellow Scene’s, we have Yellow House.)

In regards to the paper discussion. It’s expensive to produce, and we no longer need to print daily. It is out of date by the time we get it. But people still read, in fact 87% of book sales done are in print, and people under 40 are reading twice as many books as people over. People engage in in-depth, well-reported news. People are digitally saturated enough that they value an escape from the screen. However, the platform is only as good as what is printed on the paper. The shiny paper doesn’t make advertorials more interesting — and a hedge fund runs our local newspaper. That is why my team and I work so hard to fill that gap. YS covers local politics, schools, transportation, water, climate change, equity issues, corporate corruption, government corruption, the local food and entertainment scene, and whatever else is happening in our world. While I am proud of the 172 awards we have earned over the 24 years we have served as a public good, the point isn’t too brag. The point is to demonstrate how and why we have gained a following.

But true local journalism is on fumes. Just google ‘Journalism layoffs.” 

“Recent research shows that, in communities without a strong print or digital news organization, voter participation declines and corruption increases.”

https://news.northwestern.edu/stories/2022/06/newspapers-close-decline-in-local-journalism

“Even now, the discussion defers to wishful thinking about multiplying the number of ego-driven billionaire buyers for prestige papers like The Washington Post and the Los Angeles Times; about philanthropic interventions; and about Congress providing tax benefits for ailing newspapers—even those owned by the hedge funds that have gobbled up local media outlets in search of a quick buck. While there’s merit in trying some of these ideas, none of them can begin to solve the problem.

The same goes for other worthy suggestions. Breaking up existing media conglomerates is a great idea. So, too, are regulatory interventions that address the damage done by social media giants such as Facebook, which grab up local journalism without fair compensation. And, yes, tax credits for hiring journalists will help a bit in some markets. But these steps will never establish a local and regional journalism that is strong enough to give Americans the information and insights they need to govern their own affairs.”

https://www.thenation.com/article/society/local-news-revival-plan

It’s not that journalism died or people won’t read. In fact, we have so much digital fatigue that we need a break from it. The challenge is there is too much digital and too much corporate ownership that wants bigger bonuses. 

Local vets, dentists, and eye care centers are also being gobbled up. Less than 25% of veterinarians in BOCO are locally owned. YS is one of two locally owned media platforms remaining in the area. The rest are corporate, hedge funds, or out-of-staters.  That is why journalism struggles, not because it died. 

I do not foresee Yellow Scene Magazine becoming a non-profit at this time. I am unsure if that model is right for us, and I am concerned about losing funding depending on who is in power. 

I am hellbent on figuring out what it takes to keep local journalism sustainable and what it takes to convince local business owners that advertising can work if done correctly and that, depending on the content, people will engage on many platforms. 

I don’t give up, not just because I am insane but because YS editors and writers have produced exceptional journalism for 24 years, and I know the value of our work in this community. I know that it is still valued and appreciated by the residents and many business owners. We recently needed some Letters of Recommendation and asked some business leaders for theirs. 

Letter of Recommendation, John Tayer, Boulder Chamber (highlights):

“In my position with the Boulder Chamber, I recognize the critical role our local news outlets play in keeping residents informed about our activities. This holds true for everything from reporting on politically sensitive issues to capturing the details regarding one of our many events. In all cases, accuracy is the most essential element.

In short, Yellow Scene is exactly the type of local news source that is in terribly short supply these days. Though I’m not always happy when a Yellow Scene reporter calls me, I know the story they are covering will be accurate and ultimately, provide our community residents with the information they need to make informed decisions.”

Letter of Recommendation, Brie Fowler, The Fowler Group:

“I am writing to express my enthusiastic support for Yellow Scene Magazine and to provide insight into why I, Brie Fowler, owner of The Fowler Group at Coldwell Banker Realty, consistently choose to allocate a portion of my marketing budget to print advertisements in this outstanding publication.

The innovative approach that Yellow Scene Magazine takes in its editorial content and design is another key reason for my continued investment. The publication not only keeps readers informed about local events, businesses, and issues but does so in a visually appealing and thoughtful manner. This innovation and commitment to quality reflect well on all businesses that choose to advertise within its pages, including The Fowler Group. The magazine’s ability to stay current and relevant in an ever-changing media landscape is commendable and deserving of recognition and support.

Moreover, the team at Yellow Scene Magazine is a pleasure to work with. Their professionalism, creativity, and dedication to helping advertisers achieve their marketing goals are evident in every interaction. They take the time to understand my business needs and provide tailored solutions that maximize the impact of my advertisements. This personalized approach has undoubtedly contributed to the success I have experienced from advertising in their publication.” You can read Brie’s full letter of recommendation here.

I am proud of those stories, their impact on our community, and the fact that we fill a void in our corner of the world. And yeah, those 172 awards since inception are cool, too.

So, while I don’t want to “sell” you advertising anymore, I want to keep publishing (on paper and digital) a local resource that connects the community. 

This I can help you with. 

Become a sustaining supporter and get Yellow Scene Magazine delivered to your door each month.

www.yellowscene.com/support

The post We aren’t going to sell you advertising anymore. appeared first on Yellow Scene Magazine.

Yellow Scene Magazine was incredibly honored to receive 12 Society for Professional Journalism awards in the 2024 Top of the Rockies contest. Media organizations of all sizes from across four states competed in numerous categories covering design and editorial content. The awards ceremony itself was in the iconic Denver Press Club with attendees flying in from across the country, and even one of YS’s writers from Canada was able to attend, making it an international event.

Several members of YS attended the event, with six individual people there in person to collect their awards! We are so proud of our entire team, from our hard-working interns to our journalists, writers, photographers, and editors, and especially our publisher, for continuing to fight for print media and to tell truth to power, especially when both seem to be under threat. Our dozen awards show high-quality journalism, telling compelling and relevant stories, and never compromising our editorial integrity are appreciated by our peers, and needed more than ever before.

While YS is humbled to be recognized as a leader in our field, the best moment of the night was the roaring standing ovation for Sandra Fish, a journalist for the Colorado Sun. Fish was kicked out of the Colorado Republican assembly for her reporting, in an attempt to stifle free speech and access to politicians. She was recognized with an award and the applause of her peers. As members of the press, we will always fight for free speech and support those who do the same.

YS won three first-place awards: 

• Headline Writing: “If Fascism, Racism, Sexism, and Anti-Queer rhetoric is your thing, then DeSantis is for you” by French Davis
• Feature Page Design: “Why Do You Wear What You Do?” by Austin Clinkenbeard
• Legal: News: “Crossing State Lines to Get an Abortion in Colorado” by Zoe Jennings

YS won an additional nine(!) 2nd and 3rd place awards:

• Social Justice Reporting: “Book Banning on the Rise: A look into censorship in Colorado” by Danielle MacKinlay, looked into the growing threat of censorship.
• Politics: Feature: “The World: Ukraine” by Austin Clinkenbeard was a brand new column for YS, looking abroad.
• News Reporting- Single Story: “Colorado Homeowners Are Fed Up with Metro Districts but Reforms Are Hard to Come By” by Robert Davis, our housing and development expert.
• Feature: Long form: “Whose Land Are You Really On?” by Austin Clinkenbeard about the long history of indigenous peoples in our area.
• Enterprise Reporting: “The Dacono Files” by Robert Davis investigated the corruption, ethics violations, and behind-the-scenes deals on Dacono’s city council.
• Columns/Op Ed pieces: “There’s a Weapon on Campus” by Steve Nelson about the harrowing text no parent ever wants to receive.
• Climate Reporting: “A Wildfire Sheds Light” by Carolyn Elerding on how mutual aid is the best defense for increasingly strong climate disasters
• Climate Reporting: “Drought, Famine, Overpopulation, and a Lack of Water: What the Puebloans and the Colorado River Can Teach Us” by Austin Clinkenbeard, with YS nearly sweeping the Climate Reporting category!
• Ag and Environment: News: “A layered approach: Boulder’s efforts against oil and gas drilling, climate disasters in a warming world” by Natalie Kerr, in one of her first-ever articles for us!

YS staff is especially proud of our win for Best Feature Page Design which was awarded to the author but was truly a team effort. The photoshoot turned out incredible and our graphics team turned photographer Dustin Doskocil’s stunning images into an award-winning layout. It’s not just that photoshoot we are proud of, but an incident that happened about a month later as our publisher and her intern were out talking to local businesses and community members around town with the newly printed magazine. 

During a sales chat, one man opened the magazine, turned to the photoshoot, and quickly shut down both the magazine and the conversation. His reaction was confusing, but our intern noted that he seemed to dislike the images of all Black professionals that we had featured. His reaction only highlights the need for more voices, more people, and more communities to be uplifted and given the spotlight. Hate has no home here.

We want to thank the SPJ, the Denver Press Club, and all of our readers who inspire us to keep creating independent, engaging, no-B.S. content. See you there next year!

Like journalism like this? Consider becoming a sustaining supporter (and get our printed copy monthly at home.)

Democracy needs journalism more than ever. We’ve been telling the truth for 24 years. Your support helps us keep telling it for at least the next four years.

Democracy needs journalism more than ever. We’ve been telling the truth for 24 years. Your support helps us keep telling it for at least the next four years.

The post Yellow Scene Magazine takes home 12 SPJ Top of the Rockies Awards, 3 First Places appeared first on Yellow Scene Magazine.

“800-pound gorilla”

Kent Thiry is a wealthy Coloradan looking to fundamentally change the way elections are held in the state. Thiry has poured millions into different Colorado ballot initiatives over the years, including the passage of the state’s open primaries and the reimagining of the previous redistricting process. 

While Thiry is officially registered as an independent voter and has stated publicly to be a defender of democracy, his large financial contributions to local and state politics have raised questions about the fairness of money in politics. 

“I’m passionate about democracy,” he told The Colorado Sun.

Thiry was CEO of Colorado’s largest kidney care company from 1999 to 2019, he also served as the executive chairman of the board of directors for DaVita from June 2019 until May 2020.

During his time as an executive, Thiry became highly involved with politics, contributing financially to ballot measures in both Colorado and California. Between 2016 and 2018 Thiry supported four different ballot measures regarding redistricting and open primaries, all of which passed.

Both of these wins were made through the help of organizations at which Thiry either founded himself or held leadership positions. He and his company spent $2.5 million to help pass Propositions 107 and 108, the 2016 ballot measures that opened the door for independents to vote in party primaries. Nearly all the $2.5 million came from Thiry himself.

Like Thiry, other healthcare executives have made it their personal mission to pour millions into ballot initiatives, which are only allowed in about half the states. Thiry has given at least $6.9 million to Colorado ballot measures from 2011.

Overall, those in the health industry have spent more on ballot measures in Colorado than in any other state except Missouri and California, according to data from the National Institute on Money in Politics, and that’s largely due to Thiry.

“He really has become the 800-pound gorilla of the ballot initiative process in Colorado,” Josh Penry, a Republican campaign strategist who has worked with Thiry, told the Denver Post. “He wields more power in an informal way than virtually all the elected officials if you look at the impact he’s had.”

Thiry’s only political loss was a ballot measure that required dialysis clinics to issue refunds to patients or patients’ payers for revenue above 115 percent of the costs of direct patient care and healthcare improvements. As of November 2023, Thiry had donated $6.7 million to state and local candidates and ballot measure committees in Colorado.

DeVita headquarters in Denver. Photo by SportsGuy789 via Wikimedia commons

DaVita, accusations and settlements

In 2015, Thiry’s dialysis company, DaVita, paid $495 million in a whistleblower settlement where the company was accused of defrauding the federal Medicare program. The suit was filed in 2011 when  Dr. Alon J. Vainer and Nurse Daniel D. Barbir noticed that DaVita was throwing out medicine that was still usable and billing Medicare and Medicaid for it.

Apart from the Vainer and Barbir case, DaVita settled two other whistleblower lawsuits. This includes a $55 million settlement in 2012 concerning double billing for the anemia drug Epogen and a $389 million settlement in 2009 related to kickbacks provided to kidney doctors for patient referrals. Additionally, DaVita paid $22 million to settle associated claims across five states.

“Health care providers should generate business by offering their patients superior quality services or more convenient options, not by entering into contractual agreements designed to induce physicians to provide referrals,” Deputy Assistant Attorney General for the Justice Department’s Civil Division Jonathan F. Olin said of the kickback case.

DaVita has also been involved in legal disputes related to labor practices and employment issues. In 2017, the company settled a class-action lawsuit to the tune of $383.5 million filed by current and former employees alleging violations of wage and hour laws, including failure to pay overtime and provide meal and rest breaks.

And if you thought things couldn’t get any worse, a federal jury ordered the dialysis company to pay $383.5 million to families in a 2018 wrongful death suit. According to the lawsuit, three patients Irma Menchaca, Gary Saldana, and Deborah Hardin all suffered cardiac arrest and died after receiving treatment from DaVita centers. 

In 2022 Thiry and DaVita were acquitted of federal charges of suppressing competition within the healthcare sector. The charges came when federal prosecutors accused DaVita and Thiry of committing antitrust violations when they made agreements with competitors to not hire each other’s employees.

Antitrust laws aim to curb unlawful mergers and business practices that hinge on the formation of monopolies. While Thiry and DaVita were not found guilty of breaking antitrust laws they did engage in practices that severely limited the mobility of their employees from seeking employment with competitors.

Citizen United, nation divided

Until 2017, Thiry was a registered Republican, he gave financial contributions to the presidential campaigns of Republican candidates such as Mitt Romney and John McCain along with state and federal candidates from either party. Thiry has also contributed to several political action committees including Fairness Frontier PAC, Unite America, and the Shared Purpose Super PAC. 

Since the 2010 Supreme Court decision in Citizens United v. FEC, the prevalence of PACs and Super PACs has increased tremendously. Controversy surrounding PACs and Super PACs stems from concerns about the disproportionate influence of money in politics, exacerbated by the lack of transparency in campaign finance. 

The Supreme Court. Photo credit: Adam Szuscik via Unsplash

Critics argue that these groups enable wealthy individuals and special interests to exert undue influence over elections and policy outcomes, potentially leading to corruption or the appearance thereof. This influence undermines democratic principles by prioritizing the interests of wealthy donors over those of ordinary citizens, eroding public trust in the political system and creating the perception that politicians are beholden to the highest bidder rather than accountable to the electorate.

These same criticisms could be applied to a single individual funneling millions of dollars into local politics in an effort to transform the way elections are held. Not only that but the newest ballot measure Thiry is supporting, Senate Bill 101 is facing startlingly similar criticism that it would turn Colorado’s ballot access process into a “pay-to-play system” by completely replacing the state’s assembly and caucus system with signature gathering.

Critics argue that signature gathering bypasses the grassroots involvement and community engagement inherent in the caucus and assembly process. The caucus system allows ordinary party members to have a direct voice in selecting candidates, whereas signature gathering relies more heavily on paid signature collectors and fundraising efforts, potentially excluding those without financial resources.

Signature gathering typically requires significant financial resources to hire paid collectors and fund the campaign. This can disproportionately favor candidates with access to wealth or support from special interest groups, undermining the democratic principle of equal representation and opening the door to undue influence by wealthy individuals or organizations.

“Only the wealthy millionaires and billionaires and self-funders would have access to elected office in Colorado,” Colorado Democratic Party Chairman Shad Murib warned The Sun, last year.

For reference, in her bid for the position of Republican secretary of state candidate, Pam Anderson expended over $121,000 in efforts to gather the requisite 8,000 voter signatures required for her candidacy to be included on the ballot in 2022.

Rep. David Ortiz, a Littleton Democrat is also concerned that Thiry’s proposal would make getting on the Colorado ballot more difficult for wheelchair users like himself. Ortiz who was injured in an Army helicopter crash in Afghanistan says that signature collection requires going door to door or standing outside for long periods in public spaces which might not always be accessible.

Aiming higher

One theory of Thiry’s critics is that this newest ballot measure is part of a larger bid for the Governor’s office, though he and his team have denied any plans for a future campaign. By advocating for sweeping changes to the state’s election process, such as replacing grassroots involvement with signature gathering, Thiry may be laying the groundwork for a gubernatorial campaign, leveraging his wealth and political connections to shape the political environment in his favor. 

But replacing the current assembly and caucus isn’t the only thing the ballot measure could change. The bill would adjust the rules regarding when candidates can start gathering petition signatures and who can sign these petitions. Furthermore, the bill would adopt an open primary system in which unaffiliated voters could participate via ranked-choice voting. 

Other states have switched to open primaries with ranked-choice voting like that in Alaska. Open primaries with a four-candidate general election could weaken the power of both Democrats and Republicans, making ranked choice a favorite among those who’ve grown weary of the two-party system. 

Photo credit: Harold Mendoze (Unsplash)

Thiry’s significant financial involvement in Colorado politics, combined with the controversies surrounding his business practices and legal entanglements, has raised serious questions about the fairness and integrity of money in politics.

Currently, he has approximately 64 ballot initiatives he is working on getting on the ballot. He has withdrawn some since starting. YS will be working on a list of all of the proposed ballot initiatives once the dust settles.

His leadership at DaVita was marked by a focus on corporate profitability and efficiency in some cases over the lives of his patients. DaVita, under the leadership of Thiry, engaged in considerably anti-labor practices and in more than one case fought against fair and equal access to healthcare. 

Thiry’s emphasis on corporate interests and profit maximization, coupled with his resistance to certain regulatory measures, reflects a business mindset more in line with conservative values than the independent or nonpartisan persona he presents publicly. While Thiry touts that he is a staunch lover of democracy, his contributions to various political action committees and expensive self-funded campaigns to overturn the state’s election process have left some rightfully concerned. 

However, not every initiative Thiry has supported has been a detriment to democracy. Thiry presents an interesting dichotomy of a man who will support measures to increase the fairness of our electoral process but does so in a way that weakens it. Whether you support the measures Thiry is pushing in Colorado or not, it is hard to ignore the shadowy millionaire behind them.

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Democracy needs journalism more than ever. We’ve been telling the truth for 24 years. Your support helps us keep telling it for at least the next four years.

The post Kent Thiry: Democracy Defender or Real-Life Monopoly Man? appeared first on Yellow Scene Magazine.

In other words, Advertising. I know you hate it; I know why you hate it. 

Of course, it can be a big fat waste of money. But if done correctly – with strategy, it can help put your business ahead of your competition, who is, in fact, wanting to take your market share.

That’s how it works: who is getting market share and who isn’t. You might think your business is coming from Google, but by the time they have gotten to searching, they already made up their mind. Where advertising changes things is what they Google. If they are googling ‘ABC Karate’, your marketing is working. If they are googling ‘karate near me,’ you need more marketing.

However, sadly, it often is a big fat waste of money, but not for the reasons you may be thinking. People bounce from platform to platform, looking for the magical answer, which is one of the biggest reasons their marketing fails. There is no magic. Advertising is merely communication, and those who communicate in more than one channel seem to have a more solid presence. 

This little video is 7 minutes to save you grief:

I say that because I have been in this business a good minute. This is hard to believe because I am so youthful and all, but media was my first grown-up job at the age of 21. I fell in love with the ability to use my art and storytelling skills. I love helping small businesses because I think they are often far better for the economy, the environment, and their employees. But they also fight harder for their share of the pie. Unfortunately, local advertising designs and strategies are often extraordinarily bad. They convey no compelling reason to care about what you are saying, and there is often no strategic aim for what you want advertising to accomplish. No wonder you might hate advertising!

Through all my years of work and study (they go hand in hand, but studying trends is not the same as studying marketing), I latched onto this line, which came from one of my favorite books, The 33 Ruthless Rules of Advertising.

“The purpose of advertising is to establish a market equity position, to realize a growth objective.” 

Huh?

If we start with the understanding “they who own the mind, own the market,” it helps us understand our market equity position and how it impacts the bottom line. (The 22 Immutable Laws of Marketing)

Name the top furniture store in Colorado.

When did you last talk about American Furniture Warehouse in idle conversation? When was the last time you randomly read furniture store websites? Probably when you were looking to buy something, right? So, was it the web that influenced you or the awareness you already had of their brand? Knowing that people buy from people they trust, how have I heard of AFW if I am not talking about them at happy hour?

Digital has thrown a monkey wrench in helping businesses dominate their own market because it makes people believe the sale is starting on the web. The sale started long before they got to the search. It starts in the mind first.

Digital advertising has only been around for about twenty years, and we are just starting to learn more about it. Undoubtedly, digital is part of our lives, but is digital advertising really doing all that we thought it was? Some of the research shows we might have given it credit in areas it does not actually influence.

I am hiring new sales and marketing interns to help us with all the new initiatives we are taking on at YS in 2024. One of the saddest things I am learning: they aren’t being taught marketing, they are being taught digital. Which isn’t a strategy – it is part of a strategy.  Until AI (or animals) start spending money, the marketplace is based on humans. The shopper you want is a human first; you need their trust to influence them when they are ready to search.

Some things we have learned after 20 years of digital marketing. Digital does not really help create a brand identity for businesses. It is the end of the purchase funnel, but it does not do as much to influence the human being on the other end to trust your brand. What about Influencers? Isn’t that being in the media? Yes, followers help, but on a local level, most of our local businesses aren’t gaining 100,000 followers or more. As a local media outlet, on average, we reach between 50-100,000 people monthly on our website, + print monthly 45,000 + socials, of course, IG/FB/LI, and not much x. While we are local media and not retail, we use more than one channel to talk to people. Print seems to do the most for building our Sustaining Supporters Program, tho. But let us not forget, media is one of the major influencers.

People trust what they see online 90% less than if they read it in print. It is absolutely necessary to be findable on the net, and if you are selling online, even more necessary to be findable, but the marketing you do before they get to the web will make them search for you. It’s not just how they find you that matters, it’s what they think of you that matters more. What are the keywords that brought people to your website, after all? Was it really a click-through? When eBay, Shutterstock, or Amazon pay to be at the top, is it really the paid post that brought them to their website, or were people already going to their website?

But what about the young people? What about them? Were they born with computer chips? They experience digital saturation as much as us older folks. In fact, studies show that 34% of them are leaving social media or reducing screen time dramatically. Recently, I had a 20-something young man say to me, “I grew up with the damn thing in my hand, and I am sick of it.” People still want human connection – no matter their age.

A long time ago, I had a shop owner who wanted to know the exact moment that led someone to be influenced to buy. All I could say was, “the sale starts in the mind long before they are ready to buy.” Back to “they who own the mind, own the market”.

Locally, you don’t need to do what Jake Jabs does. You don’t have eight giant-mega stores to market. But every business should do what Jake does: dominate your market’s minds. Which begs the question, how well do you know who your market is?

Branding – isn’t it just throwing money away? Only if you don’t care what people think about your brand. And I guarantee the odds of my neighbors chatting about business brands at happy hour regularly will be about as limited of a reach as social media offers. Social is great for reaching the people who already like you, not so great at reaching the masses.

The most successful businesses have strategies in all three stages of the Purchase Funnel and they know that they don’t advertise when they are busy, and they don’t advertise when they are slow, they advertise because their doors are open.

We celebrate 24 years in 2024, and I am proud we are doing the kind of journalism that matters. Not just because of democracy, justice, and all those important First Amendment reasons to have honest journalism, but because locals trust us and read us.

I can’t promise you will become a Billionaire with one ad campaign, but I do know that the local brands that have utilized strategic marketing plans in more than one platform are the most successful, and that should include YS locally. (We can’t do much if you are looking for a national audience; we are local.)

We won’t let you waste your money on bad advertising either. Our in-house award-winning design and marketing house is at your service for free, because a good ad has 7x the impact of a bad one. 

That’s a lot of information, Shavonne, I don’t have time for that. That’s okay our Marketing Guidebook and Growth Objective Calculator help you navigate all of this in a strategic manner and we provide all these tools for free.

Plus we are always happy to meet and help you with your strategy with a complimentary consultation.

Some articles to dive into:

DIGITAL

The Reading Brain in the Digital Age: The Science of Paper versus Screens

The new dot com bubble is here: it’s called online advertising

What Digital Advertising Gets Wrong

POV: Digital advertising is dead. Good riddance

Is Digital Advertising Dead?

Digital Ads Don’t Work and Everyone Knows It

Is the Golden Age of Digital Advertising Dead?

Study: 34% of Gen-Z Are Leaving Social Media

How Much Time Do Digital Signage Displays Really Have With Viewers?

BRANDING

Six Reasons Why Branding Is More Important Than Ever Before

Your Ultimate Guide To Brand Equity And How To Build It

Why A Brand Matters

How Do Customers See Your Brand?

Navigating the influencer landscape: The positive and negative effects of social media influencers on adolescents

PRINT & TRADITIONAL ADVERTISING

The Print is Dead Mantra Is Lazy Thinking

Has Print Marketing Risen From The Grave?

The Future of Digital Is Print

Why Marketers Are Returning to Traditional Advertising

Are Brands Returning To Traditional Marketing?

Is Print Advertising Still Effective? Unveiling the Power and Potential of Traditional Media

Get it Free at www.yellowscene.com/advertise

Yellow Scene Magazine is an award-winning, credentialed member of the press focusing on hyper-local stories and always authentic journalism. In 2023, we won at the Colorado Press Association Annual Convention /2022 work, Best General Excellence – Class 8 , as well as Best Design Agency.

The post Let’s talk Dirty appeared first on Yellow Scene Magazine.