The Baltimore Banner: Growing from Digital Newcomer to Local News Powerhouse

Over the past several years, new media startups and industry stalwarts alike have been experimenting with new business models in the hopes of driving growth. While these strategies often look like partnerships or new revenue streams, The Baltimore Banner is driving success with a more unique approach: building a nonprofit newsroom.

Launched just a few years ago in 2022, The Baltimore Banner is a digital-first publication focused on filling the local news gap in Baltimore. Their mission is focused on delivering high-quality, independent journalism to the community — and their digital-first strategy reflects their commitment to innovation, sustainability, and public service.

“Everything we do is about delivering value to our readers,” said Biswajit Ganguly, CTO of The Banner. “As a nonprofit, our intent is to sustain a quality newsroom — not make a profit.”

That focus on community and commitment to The Banner’s mission has not only shaped its technology strategy but also fueled remarkable growth — earning the organization a Pulitzer Prize within its first three years.

Building a scalable foundation

Ganguly, who previously led a 120-person product and engineering team at Bloomberg’s Industry Group, joined The Banner to build a mission-driven tech organization from scratch. With a lean team of about 15 people across product, design, engineering, data, and IT, they were tasked with launching and scaling a newsroom for the future — fast.

Arc XP had been selected as the foundation of The Banner’s digital presence before Ganguly joined, but it turned out to be the right decision.

“When you select a CMS, you’re selecting the core of any publishing business,” said Ganguly. “For us, it had to be reliable, secure, and able to scale without requiring a heavy lift from engineering.”

Arc XP provided exactly that — including core publishing tools like Composer, WebSked, and PageBuilder, as well as integrations with best-in-class partners like Piano and Viafoura. With all these components already in place and validated within Arc XP, The Banner’s team could spend less time finding the right set of solutions and start building faster, ultimately accelerating time to value.

Creating better user experiences

The Banner’s audience grew rapidly after launch, and the team undertook a redesign of the site to support the needs of their growing audience. According to Ganguly, it was an opportunity to rethink the reader experience “from the ground up.”

“We took a step back and asked how we could deliver value to our customers, regardless of infrastructure,” said Ganguly. “When we know what user experiences mattered most, then we can focus on delivering those in the best way. If it’s available off the shelf in Arc, that’s great — if not, we have the flexibility to build it ourselves.”

Leveraging PageBuilder and templatized Themes components, The Banner was able to roll out a new and improved site experience. According to Ganguly, Arc XP never constrained their vision — it enabled it. The team was able to use certain elements directly out of the box, but they also built custom page components tailored to their needs.

Powering revenue growth with technology

Technology plays an important role in The Banner’s subscription strategy — ultimately helping to drive significant subscription and revenue growth for the publication. According to Ganguly, the combination of reliable technology infrastructure and dedication to creating great user experiences helps The Banner convert casual readers into paying supporters.

“Tech is such an important partner in our growth strategy,” said Ganguly. “Tech powers our workflow for converting audiences — and making that a seamless experience.”

The Banner used a combination of Arc XP and Piano to make their subscription strategy a reality. These tools also enabled non-technical users to manage audience journey workflows, without the help of engineering.

The Banner’s unique nonprofit business model also informs the organization’s approach to technology. The team doesn’t just see tech as tools that enable business processes or support revenue goals — but as a critical part of delivering on The Banner’s mission.

“We are customer-first,” said Ganguly. “When we make a tech choice, we have to be clear on what value it brings to our customers. We factor that in first — and it must be something that is secure, reliable, or differentiates our offering to customers.”

Delivering on a mission, and delivering results

In just over two years, The Baltimore Banner has seen rapid growth in audience, subscriptions, and revenue — all underpinned by a stable, scalable tech stack.

With Arc XP at the core of its digital strategy, The Baltimore Banner is focused on continued innovation — from leveraging AI tools like Arc XP Intelligence to unifying editorial workflows — all in service of better informing the Baltimore community.

And according to Ganguly, Arc XP will continue to play a key role in supporting that mission.

“Arc is central to everything that we are doing,” said Ganguly. “Our entire infrastructure is built around Arc, and the very first experience our audiences have with us is served through Arc. There are a lot of other tools that work around it in our ecosystem, but they have to work in concert with Arc. Arc is the heart.”