TOWNNEWS-SHA CO.,LTD. (2481) Stock Price

Town News Co., Ltd. publishes "Town News," a free community newspaper, and generates revenue primarily through advertising space sales in its pages. The company continuously covers local news including politics, economics, culture, and sports, and also publishes special features and editions that address community issues.

The company's main customers are local businesses, municipal governments, and advertising agencies, with print advertising sales as its primary revenue source. Advertisements are sold both directly to advertisers and through advertising agencies. The newspapers are printed by external contractors and distributed to households and businesses through insertion and delivery partners.

Town News publishes 36 different editions across all of Kanagawa Prefecture and three cities in Tokyo (Machida, Hachioji, and Tama), with locally-focused editorial content for each region. In addition to print, the company operates digital services including a web version, a political database called "Politics Village," a neighborhood information site called "Realia," email newsletters, and LINE distribution. The company is diversifying revenue through digital advertising sales and special feature projects.

The company aims to expand its business scale and improve performance as a comprehensive regional information provider. As of June 2025, it publishes 36 editions across 36 districts—33 in Kanagawa Prefecture and 3 in Tokyo (Machida, Hachioji, and Tama cities). Leveraging this foundation, the company plans to achieve numerical targets set in its Second Medium-Term Management Plan (Fiscal Years 45–47). To increase print advertising opportunities, it will strengthen proposal-based sales grounded in community feedback while differentiating itself from other media by carefully covering local news of greatest interest in each distribution area.

The company's priority investment areas are non-print advertising and talent development. It is allocating resources and personnel to revenue streams beyond print—including cross-editorial feature planning, printing and publishing, merchandise sales, event promotion, video production, and web advertising—to strengthen its business model of converting regional information into revenue. Simultaneously, it has established a "Future Strategy HR Department" to secure and develop high-quality journalists and sales staff, advancing new graduate recruitment, mid-career hiring, expanded training programs, and workplace reforms to enhance competitiveness.

For new market development, the company plans to expand its distribution areas sequentially and enhance its regional development business. Building on its track record of launching new districts in Tokyo, it will expand print distribution areas by comprehensively assessing market penetration and operating conditions. Additionally, it will develop public-private partnership (PPP) projects—including community development and designated management of public facilities in collaboration with local governments, residents, and businesses—as a non-print pillar, targeting revenue diversification through municipal projects and promotional contracts.

In technological innovation, the company is strengthening the integration of print and digital. Beyond its web version "Town News," email delivery, and LINE distribution, it is expanding digital-exclusive articles and original content from its digital editorial team to broaden readership, while developing new services leveraging information assets such as the politician database "Politics Village" and neighborhood information site "Realia." Accounting for rising paper costs, the company is increasing the proportion of digital distribution to stabilize its revenue structure.