This website was born in a simpler form exactly four years ago with the goal of providing fair and in-depth coverage of the UK capital’s politics, development and culture. It started as a modest vehicle for things I wanted to write and has grown into a multi-contributor platform which receives more than 70,000 visits a month and rising.
The site may still be small but it is influential, with readers ranging from transport experts, politicians, property developers, council officers, equality campaigners, think-tankers and academics to people at the very top of City Hall. All this has been achieved from one small and rather untidy room in my house on a shoestring budget, more than half of which is provided by individual financial supporters.
There are currently around 150 of those lovely people. I would like to boost their number to 250 by the middle of this year. And I can offer everyone who donates the required amount of money a bit more than just my gratitude.
All donations are very welcome. And here’s what you will get if you support On London with £5 a month or £50 a year.
- My Thursday evening newsletter On London Extra, which pulls together news, views and information about the capital city from a wide range of sources and often includes stuff that won’t be covered on the website or elsewhere (this newsletter is not to be confused with my Tuesday morning one, which simply rounds up recent On London content and is free for anyone who signs up for it via the home page).
- Free entry to On London events, including webinars, commentary and debates about the state of the city and its future. I plan a series of these in the months leading up to the London Mayor election later this year.
- Special offers on books and other publications, including On London’s forthcoming guide to the elections for Mayor and London Assembly, to be co-authored by me and top drawer psephologist Lewis Baston.
I hope that amounts to a reasonable thank you for helping to keep On London going, growing and strengthening its output.
To give you some idea of how the finances of my media empire stack up I can reveal that the turnover of On London Publishing Ltd for the year ending 31 August 2020 was £16,138 and that the company made a small loss.
That is largely because I take a bit of pride in having chosen to pay freelance writers fees that aren’t far short of those offered by Big Media outlets these days, and also because I began to pay myself a very small salary (I can’t live off my savings forever).
On London is never going to make me or anyone else rich, but that’s not what it’s for. What it is for is providing journalism about the UK’s capital city that you won’t often find anywhere else – thorough, properly-informed and resolutely anti-populist at a point in UK history when London and Londoners are routinely vilified, misrepresented and misunderstood.
So if you don’t already donate £5 a month or £50 a year and want to help me reward my contributors respectably, pay the website’s bills and generally help the cause, think of it as a small investment in London’s currently rather uncertain future. Another 100 supporters giving those amounts (or more) would bring in at least £5,000 and might turn that small loss into a profit.
There are “donate” links all over the website or, if you prefer, email me at davehillonlondon@gmail.com and I will send you On London’s bank account details.
Thank you (Dave Hill, On London Founder, Editor and Publisher).