We have made it to another heavily populated coast, and our phones almost always have a signal. In the Pacific Northwest, newspapers are a slightly rarer sighting than the Northern Rockies. In spaces like this, print media faces more challenges than it does somewhere like Wyoming. But in Olympia, Washington, one paper product still thrives – the flyer.

Olympia is a gritty, punk-rock, low-down kind of town, and outside its most popular bars and venues, weeks of show posters and ads are stapled on top of each other, torn and fluttering. Some advertise music or political rallies, or offer services (piano tuning, we recall). Many are meticulously designed; others stick to Comic Sans. This is dedication to print, an aesthetic attraction to it, despite the ease of an Instagram ad. And judging from the ripped off phone numbers, people are engaging.

About 130 miles south, in Portland, Oregon, there’s enough population for a print readership, and according to editor Aaron Mesh, alt weekly publication Willamette Week has found its niche.

“Over the last twenty years we’ve seen an obvious shift toward online,” he said. “But I think our readership continues to care very deeply about a printed product.”

The Pulitzer Prize-winning Willamette Week prints 30,000 copies every Wednesday, serving a city of over 635,000. Mesh clarified that as an alt weekly, Willamette Week has a narrower focus on enterprise and investigative reporting, something the publication has honed in the two decades since its Pulitzer Prize win. Journalist Nigel Jaquiss penned the winning story, revealing former Oregon governor Neil Goldschmidt’s sexual abuse of his children’s 14-year-old babysitter. It was the first Pulitzer awarded to a weekly newspaper for investigative journalism.

“That story shifted the dynamics of this newspaper, I think,” said Mesh. “[It] demonstrated the gravity of what it is that this newspaper can do for the community, that the daily paper was not supplying.”

The daily he’s referencing is The Oregonian, the oldest and largest newspaper in Portland. Advance Publications owns it, along with forty other papers across the nation. Willamette Week is the main independent alternative, concentrating on longform stories that dig deep.

“We specialize in finding secrets that are hiding in plain sight – digging through documents, doing interviews with people who might be skittish,” Mesh explained. “There’s an enormous appetite for that.”

Of course, much of that appetite is found online. Willamette Week’s website, wweek.com, gets around a million hits per month, and they have around 100,000 followers on both Facebook and Instagram, plus a smaller presence on TikTok and Bluesky. Their social media output heavily involves shortform video, but the content is detailed, even wordy. Mesh acknowledged that Willamette Week is not concerned with chasing every news tip that hits its readers’ feeds – rather, social media is a way to draw attention to the publication’s diligent journalism, and draw those eyes to the website or the print.

Mesh put it simply – “the goal is to reach them where they are.”

That contact is important, because readers play a vital role in Willamette Week’s business model. Print advertising is down, and online ads are not a lucrative enough replacement, so as with many other publications, Willamette Week has integrated reader donations as a means of survival. The paper remains free to read, and the Friends of Willamette Week do their part to keep it that way.

Mesh told us that despite print’s challenges, the Willamette Week newsroom is growing. They recently added a third full-time reporter to the staff and are looking to take on a fourth. When asked what it was that set Willamette Week apart from the dying print crowd, Mesh circled back to its investigative core.

“Our willingness and courage in confronting power have earned a certain reputation in this town,” he said. “Sophie Peel, one of our reporters, caused the resignation of the Secretary of State for Oregon [Shemia Fagan] two years ago. [Fagan] was moonlighting as a consultant for a cannabis company that she was supposed to help regulate.”

Willamette Week is gearing up for another election cycle as well, ranked choice style, and the staff is already preparing endorsements.

“It will be a hoot and a half,” said Mesh amiably.

Willamette Week is hard at work digging into the underbelly of a famously gnarly city, embracing the online model, with allegiance to patient journalism. Portland, Mesh says, has enough supporting eyes to keep it running.