How Ottawa Lookout Set a Path to 45,000 Readers and $100K in Annual Revenue

Overview

Ottawa Lookout is a daily local news newsletter helping residents better understand what’s happening in Canada’s capital, without paywalls, clutter, or federal politics crowding the feed.

Founded by Geoff Sharpe and Robert Hiltz, the newsletter was launched to address a clear gap: while Ottawa is Canada’s political center, local news coverage is often fragmented, buried, or inaccessible.

After validating the model, Geoff expanded into a second publication: The Beer Loop, a weekly newsletter covering beer culture in British Columbia—another underserved niche with strong community demand.

Both newsletters are fully bootstrapped and built on beehiiv.

The Newsletters

Ottawa Lookout

• Focus: Local Ottawa news, civic updates, lifestyle coverage
• Frequency: Daily
• Monetization: Advertising + paid membership

The Beer Loop

• Focus: Beer news, breweries, reviews, and weekend guides in BC
• Frequency: Weekly
• Monetization: Sponsorships (early-stage)

The Challenge

Launching and scaling independent local media came with familiar, but difficult constraints:

• Efficiently scaling audience acquisition
• Building sustainable revenue without investors
• Managing segmentation, analytics, and memberships without technical overhead

Most email platforms either lacked the analytics needed for paid growth or became prohibitively expensive as lists scaled.

The Solution

Ottawa Lookout and The Beer Loop migrated to beehiiv to solve three core problems:

• Predictable pricing as subscriber counts grew
• Advanced segmentation without complex tooling
• A platform built for publishers, not generic email marketing

beehiiv allowed the team to operate lean while supporting both free newsletters and paid membership products, without adding operational complexity.

Growth Strategy

Growth for both newsletters is driven by a mix of paid acquisition and organic sharing.

Key tactics include:

• Paid Facebook and social ads for subscriber acquisition
• Strong onboarding and daily utility to retain readers
• Segmentation to evaluate subscriber quality by acquisition source

Segmentation plays a critical role in paid growth, allowing Geoff to identify which channels produce the most engaged readers and optimize spend accordingly.

Monetization Strategy

Ottawa Lookout offers a paid membership tier that includes:

• Restaurant reviews
• Curated event guides
• Lifestyle recommendations

The goal is for membership revenue to fully cover core operating costs, ensuring editorial independence.

The Beer Loop is positioned as an industry authority, with monetization focused on sponsorships and long-term partnerships within British Columbia’s beer ecosystem.

Favorite beehiiv Features

Segmentation & Analytics
Analyze engagement by signup source to reduce acquisition costs and improve audience quality—without advanced data skills.

Editor
A fast, clean editor that saves significant time and supports consistent daily publishing.

Results

• Clear path to 45,000 readers and $100K in revenue for Ottawa Lookout
• Successful launch and validation of a second niche newsletter
• Reduced software costs by hundreds of dollars per month
• Confidence scaling paid acquisition using engagement-first data

Local media works best when it owns its audience.

Whether you’re building a city newsletter, a niche publication, or a paid membership product, beehiiv gives you the tools to grow sustainably, without sacrificing control or margin.

👉 Start your newsletter on beehiiv today