Signature Journalism in Belgium
From nameless grave to national podcast
One night in 2002, police shot dead an unidentified robber at a frituur in Beringen. 23 years later, still nobody knew who he was. The unknown body lying in a nameless grave had caught the attention of HBVL journalists Thomas Jansen and Geert Op ’t Eynde. They delved into the mystery and spent four years trying to discover the identity of Gangster Y.
Their investigation culminated in a gripping podcast that took listeners on a hunt from a cemetery in Beringen-Mijn to Romania. It was a textbook example of the 360° approach: multiple pieces online and in the newspaper, a making-of vodcast and a successful video for social media.
The first free episode had 55,000 unique listens. The podcast’s audience is strikingly young: almost 30% of listeners are under 34 and almost 60% are under 44. On Instagram we achieved 93,600 views, with 1.3 million on TikTok. The success of Gangster Y lies partly in the clear pricing strategy. The first episode is free, with the others behind a paywall.
Four years of research resulted in an interesting, socially relevant and thrilling podcast. A thoroughly Limburg story, with real national impact. That’s exactly why this journalism stands out: in-depth, persistent, played out on all platforms, turning a local mystery into a story that captivated the country.
HBVL journalists Thomas Jansen and Geert Op ’t Eynde - hosts of the Gangster Y podcast
‘White schools’: how migration has changed education
With our “White schools” investigation, we ventured into a particularly sensitive topic. How is migration affecting Flemish schools? Are they all transforming at an equal pace? Our investigation was based on a large study that looked at the evolution of schools in Flanders over the past decade.
The findings were quite revealing. In schools that already had a very diverse population in 2010, diversity increased two to three times faster than it did in the schools that were “mostly white”. In some “white schools”, diversity even decreased. We used a child’s home language as an indicator of diversity and included the mother’s education level. On a map, readers could check out a particular school and how its diversity has evolved, and how it compares to other schools in the neighbourhood. Traditional Catholic education in particular, which generally attracts pupils from higher social classes, remains largely white. Highly educated parents, typically readers of De Standaard, tend to send their children to schools that are hard to access for the children of migrants, many of whom have low education levels.
These are surprising conclusions, which we explored through reports, interviews, reader surveys, podcasts and opinion articles. Underlying the findings is the tension between excellence and inclusion. We sought to answer how and under what circumstances diversity and educational attainment go together and what drives schools and parents. We’ve rarely received more responses to a series, which reached lots of new readers and converted them into subscribers.
© hollandse hoogte - Children at school
Consumer research is also pure journalism
Is there really extra virgin olive oil in bottles that promise it? For De Grote Test (the Big Test), a traditional format that has comfortably survived any digital transformation, we test products every week. The golden rule remains leaving it to the experts.
When it came to olive oil, reporter Chris Snick and editor Lise Smout looked a bit deeper, knowing that this is an area where things aren’t always quite right. No, not all olive oils are what they claim to be – that was clear after the first tests. But we weren’t prepared for one result: one bottle contained no olive oil at all.
Consumer and service journalism are sometimes looked at condescendingly by journalists – entirely unjustly – but they’re an important pillar of Nieuwsblad’s work. Because what is true of all forms of journalism applies here, too: if you want to do it well, it takes a lot of time, expertise and persistence. And if you do it well, you’ll be particularly relevant to your reader’s daily life. For us, that’s true signature journalism. Especially when it means you can have bottles-with-everything-but-olive-oil taken off the shelves.
Testing olive oil
Leading the coverage of a European scandal
In early December, Brussels was shocked by the arrest of former EU foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini. Euractiv reporters Elisa Braun and Eddy Wax broke the news that authorities had raided the offices of the European foreign service and the College of Europe in Bruges. Two senior officials were arrested, including Mogherini, on suspicion of fraud linked to the creation of a new diplomatic academy attached to the college.
The exclusive followed months of careful reporting into the College of Europe and its diplomatic academy. When the story broke, Euractiv was able to publish a series of detailed stories on the background of the scandal – context that our competitors were unable to match.
Given Mogherini’s prominence, the scoop quickly reverberated across Europe and beyond. Media outlets ranging from the Financial Times and The Guardian to Al Jazeera cited Euractiv’s reporting as the story dominated the European news agenda.
By combining exclusive sourcing with deep subject-matter expertise, our reporters were able not only to break the story first, but to shape how it was understood – setting the pace and depth of coverage on a complex and fast-moving European scandal.
© Eddy Wax - EEAS building
What Antwerp really thinks about the airport
There’s no issue that divides Antwerp quite like the airport at Deurne. One side sees it as a scandal that an elite of jet-set figures, entrepreneurs and second home owners continue to benefit from the millions of public euros it absorbs every year. The other says that connectivity via the airport is essential for the region, with its global port, diamond sector, international businesses and tourist appeal.
The arguments happen not only in the media and in parliament, but also in the cafe and at the school gates. As Gazet journalists who live and work here, we wanted to visualise this societal divide for the first time. So we conducted a poll with the research firm Ipsos. The results surprised many, but not so much us: the vociferous opposition , which is also reported in the national media, seems to be the opinion of only a small minority of people who live here.
The publication of our survey had an immediate impact, with hundreds of responses on our app, on social media and in our mailboxes. Proponents suddenly felt compelled to stand up for “their” airport. Our research meant we could give the substantive debate a real boost.
© Fred Debrock — Antwerp Airport