The ''Berliner Zeitung'' (; ) is a daily newspaper based in

Berlin Berlin ( , ) is the capital and largest city of Germany by both area and population. Its 3.7 million inhabitants make it the European Union's most populous city, according to population within city limits. One of Germany's sixteen constitue ...

, Germany. Founded in

East Germany East Germany, officially the German Democratic Republic (GDR; german: Deutsche Demokratische Republik, , DDR, ), was a country that existed from its creation on 7 October 1949 until its dissolution on 3 October 1990. In these years the state ...

in 1945, it is the only East German paper to achieve national prominence since

reunification A political union is a type of political entity which is composed of, or created from, smaller polities, or the process which achieves this. These smaller polities are usually called federated states and federal territories in a federal governmen ...

. It is published by

Berliner Verlag Berliner is most often used to designate a citizen of Berlin, Germany Berliner may also refer to: People * Berliner (surname) Places * Berliner Lake, a lake in Minnesota, United States * Berliner Philharmonie, concert hall in Berlin, Germany ...

History and profile

''Berliner Zeitung'' was first published on 21 May 1945 in

East Berlin East Berlin was the ''de facto'' capital city of East Germany from 1949 to 1990. Formally, it was the Allied occupation zones in Germany, Soviet sector of Berlin, established in 1945. The American, British, and French sectors were known as ...

. The paper, a center-left daily, is published by

. After the fall of the

Berlin Wall The Berlin Wall (german: Berliner Mauer, ) was a guarded concrete barrier that encircled West Berlin from 1961 to 1989, separating it from East Berlin and East Germany (GDR). Construction of the Berlin Wall was commenced by the government ...

, the paper was bought by Gruner + Jahr and the British publisher

Robert Maxwell Ian Robert Maxwell (born Ján Ludvík Hyman Binyamin Hoch; 10 June 1923 – 5 November 1991) was a Czechoslovak-born British media proprietor, member of parliament (MP), suspected spy, and fraudster. Early in his life, Maxwell escaped from N ...

. Gruner + Jahr later became sole owners and relaunched it in 1997 with a completely new design. A stated goal was to turn the ''Berliner Zeitung'' into "Germany's ''

Washington Post ''The Washington Post'' (also known as the ''Post'' and, informally, ''WaPo'') is an American daily newspaper published in Washington, D.C. It is the most widely circulated newspaper within the Washington metropolitan area and has a large nati ...

''". The daily says its journalists come "from east and west", and it styles itself as a "young, modern and dynamic" paper for the whole of

Germany Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwe ...

. It is the only East German paper to achieve national prominence since

. In 2003, the ''Berliner'' was Berlin's largest subscription newspaper—the weekend edition sells approximately 207,800 copies, with a readership of 468,000. The current editor-in-chief is

Brigitte Fehrle Brigitte is a feminine given name. Notable people with the name include: * Brigitte Amm, German rower * Brigitte Bardot (born 1934), a French actress and singer * Brigitte Becue (born 1972), a Belgian breaststroke swimmer * Brigitte Bierlein (bor ...

. Gruner + Jahr decided to leave the newspaper business and sold the ''Berliner Zeitung'' in 2002 to the publishing group

Georg von Holtzbrinck George von Holtzbrinck (born 11 May 1909, Schöplenberg, Hagen died 27 April 1983, Stuttgart) was a German publisher and founder of Georg von Holtzbrinck Publishing Group. Biography In 1931, Holtzbrinck joined the Nazi Young Workers. In 1933, ...

. This sale was blocked by the German antitrust authorities since Holtzbrinck already owned another major Berlin newspaper, ''

Der Tagesspiegel ''Der Tagesspiegel'' (meaning ''The Daily Mirror'') is a German daily newspaper. It has regional correspondent offices in Washington D.C. and Potsdam. It is the only major newspaper in the capital to have increased its circulation, now 148,000, s ...

''. The ''Berliner Zeitung'' was then sold in the fall of 2005 for an estimated 150–180 million euros to the British company Mecom Group and the American company Veronis Suhler Stevenson. The employees criticized this sale vehemently, fearing that journalistic quality could suffer as a result of excessive profit expectations by Mecom boss David Montgomery. The ''Berliner Zeitung'' was the first German newspaper to fall under the control of foreign investors. Andrew Marr, former editor of ''

The Independent ''The Independent'' is a British online newspaper. It was established in 1986 as a national morning printed paper. Nicknamed the ''Indy'', it began as a broadsheet and changed to tabloid format in 2003. The last printed edition was publis ...

'', which like the ''Berliner Zeitung'' was taken over by David Montgomery, said of the ''Berliner Zeitung'' that " yone who was working at ''The Independent'' in the mid to late Nineties will find all this wearisomely familiar. David's obsession at that time was removing as much traditional reporting as possible from the paper and turning it into a

tabloid Tabloid may refer to: * Tabloid journalism, a type of journalism * Tabloid (newspaper format), a newspaper with compact page size ** Chinese tabloid * Tabloid (paper size), a North American paper size * Sopwith Tabloid, a biplane aircraft * ''Ta ...

-style scandal sheet for yuppies." On 23 March 2009, it was announced that the Berliner Verlag would be sold by Mecom to the publisher

M. DuMont Schauberg M. DuMont Schauberg is one of Germany's oldest and largest publishing houses. It was founded by Bertram Hilden in 1620. The company has been run by the Neven du Mont family since 1805, when Marcus du Mont acquired the ''Kölnische Zeitung'' ...

(MDS) in Cologne. The price was about 152 million Euro. Mecom was forced to sell its publishing interests in Germany as well as Norway because of heavy debts.

Holger Friedrich Holger may refer to: People * Holger (given name), includes name origin, plus people with the name * Hilde Holger, stage name of dancer, choreographer and dance teacher Hilde Boman-Behram (née Hilde Sofer, 1905–2001) Fictional characters * Holg ...

and his wife Silke bought the Berliner Verlag in September 2019 from M. DuMont Schaumberg. This company published beside ''Berliner Zeitung'' also '' Berliner Kurier'' and ''

Berliner Abendblatt The Berliner Abendblatt is the leading weekly advertising paper in Berlin, Germany alongside the Berliner Woche and, along with Einkaufaktuell, one of the three main media for the collective distribution of the weekly brochures of retail chains i ...

''. Friedrich wrote in the first number after he bought Berliner Zeitung, that their vision was to make politics and society more interesting again.

List of editors-in-chief

Notes

References

* *

External links

* *
''Berliner Zeitung'' online (text archive for related article)

Open access archive of ''Berliner Zeitung'' / Berlin edition 21 May 1945 – 31 December 1990
in the portal DDR-Presse of the Zeitungsinformationssystem (ZEFYS) of the Berlin State Library; access via xlogon.net (registration needed) {{DEFAULTSORT:Berliner Zeitung 1945 establishments in Germany Daily newspapers published in Germany Former state media Mass media in East Germany German-language newspapers Newspapers published in Berlin Newspapers established in 1945 German news websites