Street papers are a very effective tool used all around the world to help homeless individuals. They started around the late 1980s and have grown tremendously since then. These papers give people the ability to actually give someone a product in exchange for money all while explaining issues and highlighting the community. Street papers across the world all share the same goal and possess similarities. But, as you could imagine, communities can be very different across the globe and over the last 30 years, street papers have evolved. This is evident when examining Big Issue North, Streetwise, and Thrive Detroit. Big Issue North is based out of the United Kingdom while the other two are both from the midwestern United States. This poses many different communities and many different issues.
Streetwise Chicago
Streetwise is a 30 year old street paper from Chicago, Illinois. Their founder, Judd Lofchie, started Streetwise because he felt that homeless people in Chicago did not have a way to find dignity. Begging for change from strangers wasn’t a gratifying action for most. Their magazines feature almost anything and everything from events around the city to personal stories. The sellers do have to pay for these papers before re-selling them. It costs them $1.15 to buy and they re-sell for $3.00. One of the most admirable aspects of Streetwise is the resources they provide beyond providing the papers to sell. They implemented an employment prep and placement program for all of their sellers. They also provide essential resources like food, clothing, and hygiene products. Streetwise has grown and been through some tribulations over the past 30 years. In 2003, about 10 years after it was established, Streetwise Chicago had the largest readership among all street publications in the United States. Just a few short years later, in 2009, Streetwise announced they were facing a closure within 45 days due to lack of revenue and foundation support. That same day, $41,000 was accumulated in donations and just 5 days later they were up to $190,000. The paper has stayed afloat and is doing quite well as of now. They’ve adapted and are even doing podcasts with members of the homeless community to expand.
Thrive Detroit
Unlike Streetwise Chicago, Thrive Detroit is a relatively new street paper, first opening in 2011. Delphia Simmons founded the organization to help unhoused people get back on their feet and highlight the major issue of poverty in the City of Detroit. Much like Streetwise, the vendors do have to pay $0.25 for the papers and they resell for $1.00. Thrive Detroit does give the first 10 papers to the vendors for free. If they find success, they can invest and re-sell as much as they wish. Thrive is Detroits only street paper and isn’t as well known as Streetwise Chicago or Big Issue North. Thrive Detroit also provides resources for their vendors. They offer training opportunities money/budgeting, sales, and writing workshops. Thrive has recently tried to expand their horizons by providing opportunities to train and supply windshield repair kits to the homeless as an additional way to earn some money. Although Thrive Detroit isn’t all the way there yet, it’s very excited to see some new opportunities in an area that needs it.
Big Issue North
Big Issue North started in 1992 in Manchester, England. By 1996, Big Issue North expanded all across Northwest England to Yorkshire and the Humber. Similarly, Big Issues’ believes “that everyone has the right to earn an independent income.” Their goal is to help vulnerably housed individuals earn money through selling street papers opposed to panhandling or begging on the streets. Big Issue North provides all kinds of stories through their physical magazine, online app, and social media. Big Issue North started as a branch of Big Issue from the London area. They have been independent for 20 years but still work together with the other Big Issue branches to promote change. Big Issue North is one of the most well run and effective organizations in the business.
Impact of Community
Two of these papers are from the midwestern United States while the other is all the way across the Atlantic Ocean. One would think that the midwestern street papers would be more similar while the British paper would be much different. This is true in certain aspects but not all. Detroit and Chicago have similar cultures and similar issues but the size and efficiency of the paper aren’t close. Streetwise Chicago and Big Issue North actually have more in common with each other than they do with Thrive Detroit when it comes to impact.
Detroit has been a struggling city for a few decades now. According to the US census, 41 percent of Detroit residents live at or below the poverty line. This is the highest rate in the United States out of the 20 largest cites. Despite all the negative naratives about Detroit, it is one of the most prideful cities in the country. “Detroiters” are very proud where they’re from and the gritty, tough community that it is. Chicago is much the same as Detroit in many aspects. Chicago has a poverty rate of 21 percent in a city that is almost 4 times the size of Detroit in population. Chicago also prides itself on being a gritty midwestern city. Yorkshire and The Humber has a much different culture than Chicago and Detroit but it is a largely populated area with 5.5 million people. The poverty rate in the area is close to Chicago at 23 percent.
So why has Streetwise Chicago had so much more success than Thrive Detroit? They’re both from the same area, they both have issues with poverty. It would make sense that they’d have similar results yet Streetwise sells 20,000 copies weekly and Thrive Detroit only has 600 followers on twitter. The reason must be that Streetwise has been around for about 20 years longer and has a much bigger market. Since the City of Chicago has a population of 2.7 million people, there are many more opportunities to sell. Beyond that, they have an established brand around the city with more vendors.
Streetwise Chicago and Big Issue North have shared similar success and this is because of their established brand and the network of people they are reaching. It can’t be concluded from these three papers that the type of community has a great impact on the success of the paper. The success of the paper depends more on the range of people and time around.
The alike cultures between Chicago and Detroit may not show up in the numbers but Streetwise and Thrive do share a lot in common when it comes to style. Thrive Detroit and Streetwise Chicago both write pretty exclusively about their cities. Thrive focuses on homeless and poverty in the Detroit area. Streetwise will write about great stories, problems, or any events happening in the Chicago area. The community centric emphasis is based on need for change. As explained, both Detroit and Chicago have a lot to fix. Detroit was ranked as the most dangerous city in America by CBS. Chicago was ranked as the most gang infested city in America by The Richest. The proud residents of these cities are not content with this being the case. The organizers of these respective papers designed their papers in a way to reflect that and change that. The pride of both these cities may not correlate to the success of the paper but the content surely does.
On the opposite side of things, Big Issue North is focused on a much broader area. This makes it a much less city centric paper. Big Issue North will cover all news and whatever they feel is relevant for people to know. They are much more of a traditional news paper and just want the vendors to benefit from selling it. Thrive Detroit and Streetwise Chicago want their vendors to make some money but also want to focus on their city and bring upon change through educating the consumer.
The Evolution of Street Papers
If you want a Street Paper to be effective for 30 years like Streetwise Chicago and Big Issue North have done, you can’t use the same strategies as you did when you started. The world has changed a lot since these papers have been around and like with everything else, you have to evolve to the world around you. Thrive Detroit has only existed for around 10 years but they’ve even had to evolve to make an impact.
Streetwise Chicago has been a positive influence in the homeless community for decades, but it all had to start somewhere. Before the first edition was released in 1992, the inspiration behind it all was ‘simple’. According to the Streetwise website, the goal was to “give homeless individuals a chance to regain personal dignity and help themselves by selling a newspaper to earn an income rather than beg.” With this first idea in mind, they began releasing the papers – which started the long process of trying to heal the homeless community from the ground up. In order to continue to do this, they started to look for new ways to increase their positive impact despite the changing of technology throughout the decades. One way that Streetwise has done this is by creating podcasts that help fight the everlasting stigma that surrounds being homeless. Since they can’t walk around and individually sell podcasts, they decided to use the platform to tell the story of a young girl named Angelica, who first became homeless when she was twelve. This can help listeners understand the many different ways one can find themselves on the streets, and feel empathy towards those who were dealt a bad hand. In addition to creating a podcast, this June they also raised their commission from $1.10 to $1.85 per issue, in reaction to post COVID-19 inflation, they knew that their vendors needed to make more money. This was the first time in Streetwise history that they have ever raised their commission. Streetwise continues the be a force of good in the Chicago community not only because of their commitment to help put money in their pockets, but also by fighting the stigma and making them seem more human to the rest of the population.
Big Issue North has made changes of their own as well. Since Big Issue collectively has many branches all across the world, they were able to fully maximize their resources in todays age. In addition to selling physical papers, they’ve created online sales with the profits going to the vendors. The online issues are the exact same as the papers that are sold on the street but make it much more convenient to the consumer and can be accessed at anytime through the Big Issue app. The reader can buy a singular issue but they can also buy a 3,6, or 12 month subscription. From online subscriptions alone, Big Issue accumulated almost $2,000,000 USD. This seems like an obvious idea in 2022, as it’s difficult to find people who generally read a physical news paper on a regular basis or even at all. It is very interesting that Streetwise Chicago has not capitalized on this opportunity to benefit their vendors yet; as it is proven that evolving with the times to keep people interested is a huge way to make money. Outside of the technology world, they have grown the list of their available products into new markets, as they currently sell T-shirts, calendars, and even Christmas cards. This way, if someone is not interested in any sort of newspaper, they can still support with a purchase of a variety of options. This kind of innovation that Big Issue North has shown has not only given much more back to the homeless community – but proven that they are leaders in their respective industry and will keep doing whatever they can to give the most back to their vendors.
Since being founded in 2011, Thrive Detroit has not shown nearly as much success in their methods. Their efforts do not go unnoticed though, and are still a great help in the community. Starting 20 years behind other organizations can make your success seem miniscule, also. This is not to say that they have not had any progress. They have been creative in their strategy, doing things that neither group before has done. Thrive is similar to Big Issue North with the fact that they both have online copies available for purchase. What Big Issue North doesn’t have, however, is windshield repair kits. Thrive not only has the kits for the vendors, but they also train them so that they can go out on the streets and do it themselves. This is a step in the right direction for them, as they can continue to be diverse with what their vendors can do in order to continue making money. Thrive is up and coming and plans to keep evolving in the community so that it can become as big of a force as other organizations, such as Streetwise and Big Issue North.
Final Thoughts
Street Papers all across the world all started for essentially the same reason and all have the same goal. The street papers goal is to erase the narratives about homeless people and provide a way for homeless individuals to regain their dignity all while pulling themselves out of an unfortunate financial situation. There is no doubt that Streetwise Chicago, Big Issue North, and Thrive Detroit are all apart of that process. As shown, there are many different factors that can go into that. Not all street papers are going to find the same success because of their different communities, demographics, and strategies. Obviously, the more people that are available to be reached, the more papers will be sold. This is evident when it comes to Streetwise Chicago and Big Issue North. The substantially populated areas give these organizations an upper leg compared to Detroit because it is a much smaller market.
The area and community affects the outreach tremendously but it also affects the content of these papers. As explained, Detroit and Chicago have very similar cultures. Both cities are very prideful in their home and it is reflected in their papers. Both papers are focused on their own city and raising awareness to homelessness and the epidemic that it is. Big Issue North has a much broader area. Therefore, there isn’t as much local pride associated with its paper.
The last difference between the three papers is their method of creating an income and pushing awareness on the vulnerable. Online issues have been very productive for many street papers in the society we live in today. Thrive Detroit and Big Issue got even more creative. Big Issue North selling merchandise and Thrive Detroit providing windshield repair kits are two effective methods to benefit their vendors.
Street Papers are proven to be very effective to help communities and people struggling with homelessness. It is a wonderful thing that these three papers can provide this to their respective communities although they have different circumstances.
Works Cited
“Streetwise.” Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, 20 Aug. 2022, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/StreetWise.
“Thrive Detroit.” Urban Innovation Exchange, https://www.uixdetroit.com/projects/thrive-detroit.aspx.
“Detroit Fist: The Little-Known Story behind the Massive Joe Lewis Fist.” Travel Mi, https://www.travel-mi.com/Detroit-Fist.html#gallery[pageGallery]/1/.
“Detroit by the Numbers – the Truth about Poverty.” Bridge Michigan, https://www.bridgemi.com/urban-affairs/detroit-numbers-truth-about-poverty#:~:text=In%20Detroit’s%20metro%20area%20and,that%20population%20is%2016%20percent.
Sands, David. “Thrive Detroit Newspaper Gives City’s Homeless a Chance to Succeed.” HuffPost, HuffPost, 25 Dec. 2011, https://www.huffpost.com/entry/thrive-detroit-newspaper-homeless_n_1139028.
Fieldstadt, Elisha. “The Most Dangerous Cities in America, Ranked.” CBS News, CBS Interactive, 9 Nov. 2020, https://www.cbsnews.com/pictures/the-most-dangerous-cities-in-america/28/.
Mc. “The 6 Most Gang Infested Cities in America.” TheRichest, 26 July 2014, https://www.therichest.com/most-shocking/the-most-gang-infested-cities-in-america/.
“Streetwise.” StreetWise, https://www.streetwise.org/.
“About.” Thrive Detroit, https://www.thrivedetroit.org/about#:~:text=Selling%20just%2030%20issues%20a,they%20don’t%20have%20to!
Murray, Andy, et al. “A Business Solution to a Social Problem.” Big Issue North, 10 Oct. 2022, https://www.bigissuenorth.com/.
