Reinvention needed for free sheets to deliver again Papers that rely on cities are exploring new revenue sources after the hit from Covid, writes Ben Woods 22 May 2021 • 5:00am During his maiden speech at the House of Lords earlier this month, Lord Lebedev provided a pithy appraisal of his time as a newspaper proprietor. “I will be able to teach the House how to make a small fortune,” the Evening Standard’s majority shareholder said. “You start with a very large fortune, and then you buy a newspaper. “Lord Thomson of Fleet is quoted as describing television as a licence to print money. Newspaper publishing also seems to me like printing money, but then giving it away outside Tube stations.”