The Onion - History

History

Tim Keck and Christopher Johnson, juniors at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, founded The Onion there in 1988. The following year, they sold it to Editor-in-Chief Scott Dikkers and Advertising Sales Manager Peter Haise for less than $20,000 ($16,000, according to the Washington Post; a 2003 Business 2.0 article reported the figure was $19,000). Reportedly, it was Chris Johnson's uncle, Wm. Nels Johnson, who came up with the idea to name the paper The Onion. "People always ask questions about where the name The Onion came from," said former President Sean Mills in an interview with Wikinews; "and, when I recently asked Tim Keck, who was one of the founders, he told me...literally that his uncle said he should call it The Onion when he saw him and Chris Johnson eating an onion sandwich. They had literally just cut up the onion and put it on bread." According to former Editorial Manager, Chet Clem, their food budget was so low when they started the paper that they were down to white bread and onions.

At first, The Onion was a success in a limited number of cities and towns, notably those with major universities (e.g. Madison, Milwaukee, Chicago). Originally the entire bottom three inches of the paper could be cut off for coupons to local Milwaukee and Madison establishments, such as inexpensive student-centered eateries and video rental stores.

The creation of its website in 1996 allowed it to receive national attention. In 2000, as the publication had broken through to the mass market, The Onion was approached by Comedy Central for a buyout that would broaden the scope and reach of The Onion's brand of satire into other forms of media. In early 2001, the company relocated its offices to New York City. The paper continues to make occasional Madison references, placing odd stories in surrounding towns or running photographs of local landmarks to illustrate stories set elsewhere. In April 2007, The Onion launched The Onion News Network, a web video sendup of 24-hour TV news.

The paper's founders went on to become publishers of other alternative weeklies: Keck of the Seattle weekly The Stranger and Johnson of the Albuquerque Weekly Alibi.

Scott Dikkers is The Onion's longest-serving Editor-in-Chief (1988–1999, 2005–2008).

In January 2009, Mills left the company explaining that "the time has come for a new challenge."

In April 2009, The Onion was awarded a Peabody Award that noted "the satirical tabloid's online send-up of 24-hour cable-TV news was hilarious, trenchant and not infrequently hard to distinguish from the real thing."

In July 2009, various news outlets began reporting rumors of an impending sale of The Onion to a large media company. A further rumor indicated that such a sale would be announced on Monday, July 20, 2009. The purported sale was ultimately revealed as fictional Publisher Emeritus T. Herman Zweibel stating he'd sold the publication to a Chinese company, resulting in a week-long series of Chinese-related articles and features throughout The Onion website and publications. On Wednesday, July 22, 2009, The Onion editor Joe Randazzo clarified the issue on National Public Radio's All Things Considered, saying: "I'm sure there are many Chinese conglomerates out there that would love to buy The Onion. We are, in fact, still a solvent independently owned American company." In 2000, Campus Circle, established in 1990, formed a relationship with The Onion as Campus Circle Media (CCM).

In August 2011, The Onion's website began testing a paywall model requiring a $2.95 monthly or $29.95 annual charge from non-U.S. visitors who want to read more than about five stories within 30 days. "We are testing a meter internationally as readers in those markets are already used to paying directly for some (other) content, particularly in the UK where we have many readers," said Onion, Inc. chief technology officer Michael Greer. This new attempt at a paywall comes 6 years after the removal of the ill received Onion Premium paywall which launched in 2004 and was taken down in 2005.

In September 2011, it was announced that The Onion would move its entire editorial operation—including print & Onion News Network—to Chicago by the summer of 2012. The news of the move has left many of the writers—who moved with the publication from Madison, WI to New York City in 2000—“blindsided” putting them in a position to decide whether to uproot themselves from New York City and follow the publication to Chicago or not. Chicago is already home to the company's corporate headquarters. At a comedy show on Tuesday September 27, 2011 current editor-in-chief Joe Randazzo announced that he would not be joining the staff in Chicago. Further details of the internal issues surrounding the Chicago move—including an attempt for writers to find a new owner—are detailed in March 2012 articles in The Atlantic & New York Magazine. According to a March 31, 2012 in the Chicago Tribune founding editor Scott Dikkers has returned to editorially helm the publication stating that he hopes to find a "younger and hungrier" pool of talent than what was available in New York City. "The Onion is obviously always going to draw talent from wherever it is," Dikkers said. "In Madison, people used to just come in off the street … and we'd give them a shot. The Onion has always thrived on the youngest, greenest people."

In August 2012, it was revealed that a group of former The Onion writers have teamed up with Adult Swim to create comedy content on a website called Thing X. "The Onion writers had nothing else going on, and AdultSwim.com wanted to take advantage of that. But only because they smelled a business opportunity. Adult Swim is just looking at it from a business standpoint."