Twelve months, ten thousand copies per issue, more than two hundred points of distribution. In Florence, every fifteen days ‘they wait’ for their freshly printed copy. Over twelve thousand people have visited the website over the last six months, and a hundred subscriptions have been sent to readers in the United States, Canada, Australia and throughout the rest of Tuscany. 24 pages – soon to be 32 – of international news, interviews, cultural features on lifestyles, art and tourism. These are the statistics sustaining the editorial adventure that began on April 21, 2005.
300,000 copies of the full-colour newspaper have been distributed in one year, reaching and informing the 50,000 Anglophones who out of love for Florence, or love of a Florentine, currently live in this city or the surrounding area. There are managers of multinational and international companies here with their families. There are professors and students from dozens of language schools, not to mention forty American and foreign universities. There are the art lovers and the artists who populate galleries and craftsmen’s workshops. During its first year of life, The Florentine has become a link between the city and those who are living in Florence or just passing through for a slice of its beauty. Thanks to the news and features, the newspaper has become not just useful but neccessary. It has also become a way to counteract the culture shock of the newly-arrived by means of an information network and constant ‘survival advice’ that helps readers understand and make the most of Florence, a city that does not always allow itself to be easily interpreted.
The Florentine has quickly ‘captured’ the attention of residents as well as tourists. According to the APT, 1 million tourists visit Florence each year. The paper has become a friendly face for the traveller who finds The Florentine in the hall of their hotel, or sometimes right on the bed-side table of their own guest room.
Want some evidence of ‘The Flor’s’ popularity? Go to the Odeon on a Thursday night, and see what’s playing in original language. You’ll find half the audience leafing though The Florentine as they wait for the show. Follow the paper’s distributors as they cross the city in The Florentine Van, and watch English-speaking pedestrians hail them down in the middle of the road, desperate for a fresh copy right off the front seat. Wander the halls of the city’s universities, you’ll find The Florentine’s junkies waiting for their bi-weekly English-speaking fix. Its readers are everywhere. An American family, planning to stay in Florence for six months, insistently asks the concierge at their residence for the new issue. A mother-tongue professor looks for copies to share with her students during lesson. These are the incidents that crop up around Florence on Thursday afternoons. These scenes, along with the 6,000 emails received from readers and friends, feed the enthusiasm of the people who make The Florentine happen. Twenty months of creative encounters between a tightly-knit group of mixed personalities. From writers to communication managers and graphic designers, diverse nationalities, each with a different temperament and unique but complementary skills. English-speakers and Italians of all ages, who have enhanced this periodical’s slant and point of view, thus setting the stage for the world of The Florentine.
The Florentine is a new messenger who lives and breathes in Tuscany. It has become a point of reference for international culture and language in a city that fluorishes thanks to the open dialogue between those who love and need her.
