An unwritten rule at every major newspaper has always been that there should be a wall between advertising and editorial, but in the June 9 issue of the Columbia Flier that rule was broken. The article on page 8, "Nelson is the new face for marketing CA", with two very nice photographs of Columbia Association president Phil Nelson supplied to the paper by the photographer who did the ad photos, violates all rules of good journalism.
The Columbia Association is a major advertiser with Patuxent Publishing, as you can see with their weekly full-page ads on the back cover of the Flier. Please note I am not criticizing Phil Nelson, the ad creative or Columbia Association. It is the editorial staff at Patuxent Publishing that should know better then to give a shout-out to a major client with a full-page article about how pretty an ad is in their paper.
The article never addresses if the Nelson ad campaign has been effective. Has the ad spend with Patuxent yielded a return on investment for CA? Have more package plans been sold? The ad feels good and looks swell, but has the campaign worked? In the interest of full disclosure, Patuxent should have said "CA has spent X dollars with us year to date and we have a contract with them for X dollars for the remainder of 2011."
I understand that print editions of newspapers are desperate to survive in the digital age but journalistic ethics should never be compromised.
Roger Caplan
River Hill