Washington state biz journal changes name

The Snohomish County Business Journal in Washington state has changed its name to the Herald Business Journal.

Kurt Batdorf, the editor of the paper, writes, “It’s not really a new name, since the newspaper you’re reading now made its debut as The Herald Business Journal in April 1998. We’re making the name change to The Herald Business Journal to better align our marketing efforts with our corporate sibling, The Daily Herald.

“‘Businesses and leaders know that The Daily Herald has been devoted to Snohomish County for a long time,’ Herald executive editor Neal Pattison said. ‘We want to make it clear that our monthly business journal is a part of that same news operation, with the same kind of community commitments.’

“Dusting off the old Herald Business Journal name also means we’ll have a new Web address: www.theherald businessjournal.com. Using www.scbj.com will continue to direct online users to the new address.

“‘We launched it as The Herald Business Journal in April 1998 because we wanted the link with The Daily Herald to be clear,’ founding editor John Wolcott said. Also, the Everett Business Journal launched the same month and we knew that close links to The Daily Herald would pay off in popularity and advertising for the HBJ.’

“When the Everett Business Journal failed and The Herald bought its assets a few years later, the name change to the Snohomish County Business Journal made sense. It helped readers know that they could expect to see business stories from all over Snohomish County, not just from Everett.”

Read more here.

Chris Roush

Chris Roush was the dean of the School of Communications at Quinnipiac University in Hamden, Connecticut. He was previously Walter E. Hussman Sr. Distinguished Professor in business journalism at UNC-Chapel Hill. He is a former business journalist for Bloomberg News, Businessweek, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, The Tampa Tribune and the Sarasota Herald-Tribune. He is the author of the leading business reporting textbook "Show me the Money: Writing Business and Economics Stories for Mass Communication" and "Thinking Things Over," a biography of former Wall Street Journal editor Vermont Royster.