I went looking for the weekend papers but found a gap in the market instead
Stockholm
It’s Sunday morning and we’re heading out for a stride around the city. The route is generally the same every visit and takes in sturdy embassies, funkis-style apartment buildings, a local shopping mall for a coffee and a spin around the grocery store, a few large parks and then more fine residences and diplomatic compounds.
Before heading out I ask the gentleman running reception if the weekend papers have arrived and he says that The New York Times in print is a thing of the past in Sweden and that he doesn’t know when the FT Weekend will show up. “It should have been here by now but you never know these days,” he says with a frown. “Everyone wants a newspaper on the weekend and we’d like some alternatives but there aren’t any.” We exchange a few more words on the topic and as I head for the door he says: “Maybe time for you to launch one, Tyler.”
The idea occupies my thoughts for the rest of the walk, the weekend and the past week. It’s not the first time that I’ve considered the idea but 18 months ago, with other projects on the go, I took it off the back burner, put it in an airtight container and placed it at the rear of the fridge. Now I feel that it needs to thaw out and get some air. Would you buy an English-language paper or are you happy with your current offer? Do you even need paper with so much available on screen? Does it need to be delivered or would you make the trip to the kiosk to secure a copy? On my way back to the hotel I pass the newsstand on Karlaplan plaza and there’s a healthy stack of the FT Weekend piled up at the cashier. I grab two copies (one for Mom too) and head back to the hotel. I’m happy to tuck it into my tote for the trip to Bahrain but something is missing.
Dubai International Airport
It’s just after midnight on Monday morning and I’m waiting for my connection to Bahrain. The Emirates First Class lounge is sprawling and not a thing of beauty. It’s too bright for the hour, it’s understaffed and there are few places to properly recline. One thing the carrier does well is support its local printers by offering an array of editions from all corners of the world – but there’s something missing here, too. What is the English-language news outlet for the Gulf in print and digi that’s best in business, culture, style and more? Is it Abu Dhabi’s The National? Supposedly things are happening at the Khaleej Times but I can’t find a copy. Is this another media opportunity?
Bahrain
What a gentle landing – in more ways than one. The airport is human scale and I’m off the plane, through customs and into the car in about five minutes. It’s around 03.00 and the football pitches are full of young men kicking balls around but the route to the hotel is reasonably quiet. I’m greeted by Mohammed, a well-groomed Bahraini, who shows me up to the room and tells me that all is prepped for what promises to be a busy day ahead. I snatch about five hours of sleep, meet my colleagues Davy and Mikey and off we go. Bahrain is not Qatar or the UAE or Oman – it’s tiny, easy to manage and by midday I’m starting to like it.
Down some streets I feel like I might be in Beirut’s Hamra and then there are flashes of glitz and the Gulf as we know it. The working day ends with a few hours at the barber and then shifts to dinner at the just-opened Brasero Atlántico and rolls onto an impromptu house party at a wonderful 1980s villa in Yateem Gardens complete with 02.00 shawarma delivery.
Bahrain is generous, welcoming, dense in parts and wide open in others, scruffy in some corners while perfectly polished elsewhere. I like it, I want to see more, meet more Bahrainis and explore more modernist compounds – but the flight to Dubai, then on to Paris, is boarding. More soon.
