Pitching us is simple. There’s one crucial factor we think about when considering pitches: publishing work which is engrossing, exciting and fun to read — even if the topic is serious.
A great read can take many different forms: it could tell a gripping narrative. Your proposed piece might make a compelling argument which hasn’t been put forward before. It might be an exclusive investigation highlighting possible wrongdoing, incompetence, negligence, abuse of power or something more sinister. You might set out to clear up widespread confusion on a topic most people in this city don’t understand or interrogate a cliche about your area that’s more complicated than it first appears and set the record straight.
It could spotlight a side of a hotly-discussed topic underreported by other publications. Perhaps you want to get really granular about a viral trend centred on the city or pitch us some great first-person gonzo style reporting. You might simply be very funny about a trend or problem in your city — in which case, step this way, please. And we love all things data.
Often we get pitched articles about topics – please instead tell us what it is you want to say about them. For example, pitching us an essay about London nightlife doesn’t make our pulses race. But we’d be delighted to get a pitch which outlines the writer’s opinions on London nightlife, what questions the essay will pose and that gives us a sense of what the answers might be.
For example, something like: “I’d like to argue that despite the naysayers, London nightlife is in rude health. The image of decline is a PR campaign that has been orchestrated by [RIVAL CITY MAYORS/ANTI-SADIQ KHAN ACTIVISTS/AGGRIEVED MALCONTENTS/INSERT AS APPROPRIATE] and that there are plenty of late-night venues, from licensed venues like [XYZ] to the many [FREE PARTIES/WAREHOUSE RAVES/BASEMENT SHUBS/INSERT AS APPROPRIATE] around the city. London’s nightlife can’t be compared to other cities because London is not like other cities for [REASONS]. In this piece I will look at the history of London nightlife and examine the challenges it faces today, interviewing [WORKERS/PROFESSIONALS/DANCERS/EXPERTS/ETC]. I hope to answer what we even mean when we talk about ‘nightlife’ in a city so diverse as London.”
Similarly, a proposed story or narrative will always trump a topic. So an essay about London nightlife might sound a bit quiet but (to use another hypothetical from the above pitch), a story about the shadowy organisation trying to undermine Sadiq Khan by sowing a narrative of decline via nightlife sounds fascinating.
When pitching us, please consider the following questions:
- What would your reporting entail? Who would you speak to for the piece? Most freelancers tell us they’re going to speak to experts on the topic. We’re much more eager to commission work where you speak to people who are affected by the subject (rather than detached experts). So if you’re writing about a bust-up in the influencer world, we’d want you to have access to interviews on both sides of the dispute. Or if you’re writing about policing in your area, we’d expect interviews (even off the record) with police.
- Would your idea naturally sit in a national or international publication? If the answer is yes, this might not be for us. We always want work with a specifically local angle. A piece about the rise in popularity in sourdough pizza restaurants in London would be a better fit for a national — it isn’t specific to the city, since you could argue this applies to plenty of UK cities. But a piece about a particularly thin sourdough pizza crust native to the city made possible by the hardness of London water has a local angle. As does a pitch about a Brixton pizza restaurant poaching another restaurant’s pizza chef to steal her recipe for sauce and the repercussions throughout South London’s pizza scene.
- For non-narrative pieces, please consider: What’s your argument? In your pitch, you should outline your opinions on the topic, what questions the essay will pose and give us a sense of what the answers may be. What’s the context? What have other people argued or reported on the topic? What will your piece bring to the topic which is new?
- Why would the average reader be interested in this? Why is this compelling?
As with any publication, the best way to get a sense of how to land a successful pitch is to read us extensively! Please only pitch us once you’ve read a good number of our articles.
What we pay: We agree a fee with writers when we make a commission and our fees vary greatly depending on the type of story. We pay from around £300 for a quick-hit and approximately £500 for something more reported and we also have the budget to pay significantly more for highly investigative stories that take months of work.
We also cover reporting expenses if they are agreed in advance with the commissioning editor. And we will pay an appropriate ‘kill fee’ if the story doesn’t work out.
How to reach us: Please send your pitches to editor@the-londoner.co.uk