Opinion

Richard L. Connor | Opinion

October 21, 2007

Smaller media markets, like TL’s, doing fine

By Richard L. Connor rconnor@timesleader.com
Editor and Publisher

SOMETIMES I FEEL as though I am standing on the top deck on the Titanic shouting, “Don’t panic. This ship is not sinking.”

But, it’s not a ship I am captaining. It’s a newspaper.

It’s a newspaper fighting other newspapers, both in terms of performance and in terms of reporting about our industry.

Whenever I meet someone and I tell them of my life invested in publishing, they take on this funereal visage and tell me how sorry they are about the state of the newspaper business. In this past week, that sense of doom has been heightened by news that the venerable Scripps Company in Ohio is creating separate divisions, separate companies, for broadcast and print.

Speculation is that Scripps’ newspapers, the division run by former The Times Leader Publisher Mark Contreras, might be up for sale.

On top of that news, McClatchy, the California company that last year was the darling of the newspaper business with its purchase of the Knight Ridder newspapers, this past week reported dismal financial performance for the third quarter. Its stock is at an all-time low.

When McClatchy bought Knight Ridder’s 32 newspapers, as our readers know, it spun off 12 of them for sale and The Times Leader was in that group.

I am not being smug -- because McClatchy is a first-rate company with talented executive leadership -- but maybe it should have kept The Times Leader, which it sold to me and my investors. We are faring quite well amid these stormy seas. And we face not only industry-wide challenges but also have a head-to-head competitor.

Here’s why I’m the contrarian on the newspaper business, particularly in smaller markets. First, a major research project just reported that our area has the highest newspaper readership in the country. The Boston area previously held that distinction.

Secondly, our third quarter was the best of the year. Total ad revenues increased 9 percent from the previous year. Our local retail advertising was up 7.2 percent and classified advertising, an area hard hit at other papers across the country, was up 8.3 percent from the prior year.

In September, our advertising revenues were up 4 percent from the previous year. Our campaign to raise $100,000 for community donations through subscriptions in recognition of the newspaper’s 100th Year Anniversary was so successful we raised the money in five weeks. We expected it would take us more than double that amount of time to reach our goal.

So popular is that campaign we are continuing it, and in 2008 we expect to send tens of thousands of more dollars to your favorite charities and causes.

Our circulation department this past week won four first-place awards for creative selling ideas, promotions, and its increased customer service program, which includes delivering our newspaper at 5 a.m.

Our online advertising has a 4.6 percent revenue increase compared to last year. This month our new Web site will have more than 2.3 million page views, an all-time high. We continue to recognize the changes in our industry and in our audience, and by combining the Internet with a stronger news and advertising product, we are reaching more homes and numbers of readers than any time in the newspaper’s history.

Now, all of that news, which I consider highly positive, should be viewed against a backdrop of newspapers across the country reporting revenues down 5 percent to well over 10 percent versus last year. Despite those national numbers, I remain optimistic about the newspaper business, which we now all know is better categorized as the information business.

So, why is the news at The Times Leader so different from what you are constantly hearing and reading?

First, nationwide trends often do not reflect what is happening locally. Secondly, in our business, the newspapers being hit the hardest are the big-city dailies. Third, newspapers and other information outlets report on national statistics as if they represent an entire industry when they do not.

Other industries face the same type of problems I have, which is convincing people newspapers are still a good business. First, keep in mind that even in bad times many newspapers enjoy profit margins well over 20 percent.

The Times Leader’s business is strong in automotive and real estate advertising, two areas that are in decline at other newspapers. Both those business sectors are having success locally, by the way. And those business people who are successful in automotive and real estate have the same complaints I do.

If you take what you read about those businesses you are left believing they are in the tank. Well, there are problems nationally but locally we have success stories. New home developments are under way in the Wyoming Valley and the houses in them are selling.

Our largest automobile advertiser is reporting a banner year.

Representatives of those local businesses constantly ask me to set the record straight and tell readers we are doing OK here in the Wyoming Valley. They want us to sing the praises of success.

This is it. Hey, Ma, things are all right here at home. We have prosperity and growth. Difficult as it may be to comprehend after years of having this regional inferiority complex, those of us who live here need to know these are not the worst of times. Maybe they are not the absolute best, but we are doing better than others.

Richard L. Connor is editor and publisher of The Times Leader. He can be reached at rconnor@timesleader.com

Tweet	Follow @TLnews