If your view of Shetland is the crime-tinged world of Ann Cleeves’ novels, imagine what it would be like to be a newspaper publisher there.

Now the owner of the islands’ only local newspaper has handed the reins to a mainland successor, bringing to an end years of local ownership and production.

Publishers Robert and June Wishart have sold the paper to Inverness-based Highland News and Media, ending 131 years of family ownership.

Wishart said he had feared that not only their connection, but the newspaper itself was at risk.

“Now I’m delighted that Steve Barron and Highland News and Media have raced to ensure continuity of production following our abrupt decision to end print of the paper at Gremista.”

Somewhat ironically, the change – the Times will now be printed on the mainland – comes just as the arrival of two 59-tonne transformers offered grid connection and the beginning of the end of frustrations over electricity security.

Another irony was a report in what Wishart calls the “BBC-subsidised competitor”, the Shetland News, which he says based its story on material from the Shetland Times newspaper, shared it online for free and used a photograph taken from their bookshop’s Facebook page to illustrate it. Having weathered the pandemic, inflation and changing trends, paper sales and advertising are “not what they once were and it has become increasingly difficult to balance the books”.

Impact of the changes on print readers include a move from broadsheet to tabloid and all-colour production. Industry publication Press Gazette said circulation had fallen from an audited 11,000 copies a week in 2009, to an NUJ-estimated 3400 in recent years.