Extra

Created in 1998, the same year Época magazine came out, the newspaper Extra is also part of Infoglobo Comunicação e Participações S.A., a subsidiary of Grupo Globo with the purpose of managing the group’s print journalism (O Globo, Expresso), the real estate services and the e-commerce online portal Zap Imóveis.

Extra has a circulation of 92 thousand copies on weekdays and 168 thousand copies on Sunday, besides the online views. The consumers research done by Infoglobe indicate that the newspaper is read mostly by mid and lower middle-classes, according to the following numbers: A (upper class) 3%, B (middle class) 23%, C (lower middle class) 57%, D/E (lower class) 16%.

As a result of the sales and subscriptions decline, Infoglobo executives have decided that the newspapers O Globo and Extra would unify their production after February, 2017, to reduce costs.

This is a different reality than the one that originated the newspaper. In the months that anticipated the Extra’s creation, Grupo Globo made a promotional campaign mobilizing the population of Rio de Janeiro for the creation of the newspaper’s name. This first initiative reveals the importance of popular participation for the publication’s profile. Even today the company states on its website that “the newspaper is recognized by its loyalty and closeness” to the readership.

Unlike the O Globo newspaper, Extra uses a more “popular” language style, design and news agenda, with a more straightforward approach, closer to ordinary life. These characteristics marked a trend from the late 1990's in the Brazilian print news editorial market: the creation of “jornais populares” ('tabloids') by groups that already produced more traditional newspapers.

Since 2009, for example, Extra maintains the character of the “boneco cidadão” ('citizen puppet'), which has had three male versions ("João Buracão”, “Zé Lixão” and “Zé Lador” - 'Hole John', 'Garbage Joe' and 'Janitor Joe') and, more recently a female one, "Maria Guandu". The campaigns promoted by the newspaper around the characters revealed useful to change the City Hall’s agenda and priorities in order to respond to complaints. In recent years Extra has announced that “Zé Lador is now closer to the people […] the hero now receives complaints via Whatsapp”.

Extra currently counts on popular columnists in different areas: doctor, writer and TV host (TV Globo) Dráuzio Varella, writer Paulo Coelho, catholic father Marcelo Rossi, TV host (TV Globo) Ana Maria Braga, former soccer player Gérson and evangelical pastor and singer Aline Barros.