FOR SALE: Newspaper. Runs good. Driven daily and Sunday for decades. Leans slightly to the left. Fully loaded: includes presses, delivery trucks, journalists, newsprint reels, many working news boxes. Has fresh coat of layoffs. Needs some work: cost-cutting, redesign, updated Web strategy. Offers buyer a unique chance to be a local big cheese. Seller is highly motivated–will take best offer.
I wrote that as a lede on a post nearly three months ago, and since it was sort of clever, I'll recycle it here. The point was–and is, even more so today–that there are a lot of newspapers for sale, and it's not clear there are going to be many buyers for them. That's going to be bad news for a lot of cities.
As it happens, my previous post on this topic was written Sept. 18, which turned out to be essentially Day One of the economic meltdown we now know and love so well. The environment for selling newspapers has gotten far more grim since then, as advertising revenue has plummeted. Let's check the latest doings on the used-newspaper lot:
- The Miami Herald was quietly put on the block by McClatchy recently, according to The New York Times. So far, no takers for what was one of the great U.S. newspapers and is still a strong regional voice. What may be most attractive about the paper right now to a buyer? Its prime waterfront real estate.
- The Rocky Mountain News was put up for sale by Scripps this week. Also a major regional newspaper. Most experts–including its primary competitor–believe it will be forced to close in the next few weeks because a buyer seems unlikely.
- The Virginian-Pilot was taken off the market this week by Landmark Media Enterprises this week, after several months of searching for a buyer, to no avail. Other Landmark papers, including the Greensboro News & Record, were pulled off the market a few weeks ago, for the same reason. Landmark says it will try again when the economy improves–which it acknowledges may take years.
- Copley's San Diego Union-Tribune remains on the market, despite regular rumors that a sale is imminent. One supposed suitor: No less than Tribune Co. czar Sam Zell, who on the contrary would probably love to find somebody to take some of Tribune's papers off his hands. (Tribune, incidentally, reportedly has hired a specialist in "financially distressed situations" to look at ways out of its own financially distressed situation.) MediaNews and The New York Times Co. are also rumored to have kicked the tires in San Diego. All three seem unlikely buyers, given the current conditions.
- Cox Newspapers still hasn't found a buyer for the Austin American-Statesman and several other smaller papers it put on the market in August. Supposedly, there are 50 potential buyers for the Austin paper. Really? Show us the money.
- Beleaguered Journal Register is looking for buyers for two small Connecticut dailies and a string of weeklies in the Nutmeg State. Failing that–and the company doesn't appear optimistic–Journal Register says the papers will be closed in January. Local officials are scrambling to find some sort of a rescuer.
- The Blethen family, owners of the Seattle Times, recently finally found a local buyer for its newspapers in Portland, Me. No more calls, we have a winner! This is the first significant newspaper sale in months. But the papers were on the market for eight months, and in the current economic and financing climate, this sale can't be rung up for sure until it closes, allegedly before the end of the year.
What happens if there are no buyers for the papers that are for sale? In some cases, as in Landmark's example, their owners will take them off the market and try to tough things out, making more cuts and hoping for the good times to return (real) soon. Some may yet find buyers, albeit at vulture-level bargain prices (again, watch for deep cuts by the new owners). There's some talk of converting some papers into not-for-profit local trusts; I'll believe that when I see it, since even a not-for-profit enterprise has to at least break even to stay alive long-term. Another strong possibility, argues The Wall Street Journal: a fresh wave of industry consolidation and mergers, perhaps along regional lines.
In some cases, as at the Rocky Mountain News and Journal Register's Connecticut papers, the lack of a buyer will force their owners to write "-30-" to decades of local newspaper history. That's the saddest outcome. But for the foreseeable future, it may be the most likely.
This week, Fitch Ratings, a Wall Street investment service, predicted what some of us have been suggesting for a while: Given the fundamental changes in the newspaper industry, accelerated by the effects of the economic crisis, we probably are on the verge of seeing a bunch of newspaper closings. "Fitch believes more newspapers and newspaper groups will default, be shut down and be liquidated in 2009 and and several cities could go without a daily print newspaper by 2010," Fitch forecast, ominously. Indeed, if there are no buyers for increasingly desperate newspapers, that, unfortunately, is going to be the end game. And the Rocky Mountain News, barring a miracle, will just be the first of many papers to disappear in the new year.
Maybe newspaper companies should try running that for-sale ad on craigslist. Nah....
One joker is way ahead of you in Denver. Check out the Craiglist ad for the Rocky Mountain News. http://denver.craigslist.org/bfs/946223554.html
Posted by: Mike | December 06, 2008 at 01:09 PM