Having launched in December 2018, Queen City Nerve has proudly published around 200 print newspapers, 100+ podcasts and thousands of online pieces covering local news as well as the city’s rich cultural, arts, music and culinary scenes. 

Today, we sadly must announce the closure of Queen City Nerve after nearly eight years of providing community journalism to the people of Charlotte.

Earlier this month, we announced we would be halting our print publication. At the time, we were still in discussion with a potential buyer that was excited to bring Queen City Nerve back stronger than ever. However, due to issues that were no fault of either party, that will no longer be possible. 

As we described in our print announcement, following six years of steady growth, we began to run up against financial hardships in 2025 and, despite a restructuring at the end of that year, we have not been able to bounce back from that. 

Having exhausted all options in our efforts to keep Queen City Nerve alive, today we must shut the doors. 

This is part of a larger pattern that’s been slowly unfolding across the country. As we witness the rise of unsourced “influencer” journalists and AI-generated news stories, we believe as strongly as ever in the importance of well-sourced, independent community journalism.

We are extremely proud of the award-winning work that we and our many contributors have published through this outlet since our launch. 

Countless people over the years have told us that Queen City Nerve was how they found their community after moving to Charlotte, or that our weekly coverage of Charlotte City Council inspired them to engage with local government for the first time. 

While some of our most viral stories may have been the ones that called people out or held them accountable, our regular readers know that on a daily basis we highlighted businesses that often didn’t get a voice otherwise and told stories that were not likely to be told elsewhere. 

We could wax nostalgic and list one article after another as examples of our best work, but the truth is that every single story that’s been featured in our publication — every community organizer, every small business owner, every resident who had their voice heard and every contributing writer who helped share that voice — means everything to us.

And to our readers, thank you for being in community with us and giving us purpose over the years. We put everything we had into making Queen City Nerve the best it could be. It’s been a great run and we wish it could continue on, but all great things must end. Farewell. 

-Ryan Pitkin, editor-in-chief

-Justin LaFrancois, publisher

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