For nearly 25 years, the Bowling Green Daily News has relied on a familiar digital foundation—a trusty, if aging, content management system (CMS) that served as the backbone of our online presence. Through countless stories, photos and videos documenting the triumph, heartbreak, and community resilience of Southcentral Kentucky, the website became a digital mainstay for residents in our region. But as the years have gone by, the limitations of the aging platform began to show: sluggish load times, clunky navigation, and a design that no longer reflected the engaging and vibrant spirit of the community we serve. It was time for a change.

The decision to modernize www.bgdailynews.com came about 6 months ago when we decided  paper’s online presence needed more than a facelift; it needed a reinvention. We’ve always been a reflection of our community. But our website was no longer keeping pace with the energy and innovation we see every day in Bowling Green. It was time to step into the future. The decision was made to migrate to a new CMS with a modern, better mobile-first design. The new platform promises not only faster performance but also better tools for our journalists and a more engaging experience for our subscribers, readers and advertising clients.

Our old system was like a house we’d outgrown. It had served us well, but the foundation couldn’t support what we wanted to build next. Over the last month, our team worked tirelessly to make the switch. Our team still has decades of archived stories, photos and newspaper pages…nearly 900,000 that we are working to export in the coming month into the new site.

Part of that transition team is Larry Simpson, our IT manager, who has been with the paper long enough to remember making photo engravings and setting hot type for the press. Simpson is the probably the  greatest story of a newspaper person adapting to technology over a more than a 60 year period. He has seen and done it all, from paste up with wax to diskettes, Zip drives, CAT5 cables and finally to the cloud. 

We customized and created new design templates. Every decision was made with readers in mind—how could the site make it easier to find stories, engage with content, and stay connected to the community?

On launch day, actually Thursday at 9 p.m., I sat hitting the refresh button on my web browser like I was trying to get a good boarding pass number on a Southwest Airlines  flight. The new design is a revelation: bold headlines, vibrant photo display, and an intuitive interface that allows readers to scroll seamlessly from breaking news to in-depth features. A revamped community calendar, email newsletter, e-Edition placement mobile friendly flex design and navigation make for a much better reader experience.  

For our team at the Bowling Green Daily News, the new site is more than just a technological upgrade—it is a recommitment to our mission of serving the community. The launch has set the stage for even more innovations to come in the future for our digital storytelling companion to our print edition. 

This isn’t just a new website, it’s a promise to our readers that we’ll continue evolving, just like Bowling Green itself. We’re here to tell your stories, better and faster than ever before with the same accurate, ethical standards that have driven us in the past. After 25 years on our old website, the Bowling Green Daily News has found a new way to tell your story—and we are just getting started.

Joe Imel is the Publisher of the Daily News and 9 other Carpenter Media Group newspapers in Kentucky, Ohio and Tennessee. He can be reached at (270) 783-3273 or via email at joe.imel@bgdailynews.com.