More bad news for Lee

This has not been a good year for Lee Enterprises. That’s the company that owns the Rapid City Journal, Chadron (NE) Record, and the Hot Springs (SD) Star, among many others. Their most visible property is the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.

Lee this week (7/30/09) reported a loss of $24.5 million during the last fiscal quarter. Its advertising is off more than 24% from last year, and circulation is down by more than six percent.

The company is based in Davenport, Iowa.

In earlier postings about Lee, we noted that they were going through many of the same kinds of problems being encountered by virtually all of the newspaper industry. There were layoffs at many of their properties in Wyoming, South Dakota and Montana.

We paid $2.00 for a Wall Street Journal yesterday and observed that USA Today, the Gannett property started by South Dakotan Al Neuharth, now goes for $1.00 a copy. These hefty newsstand prices do little to offset the record losses being endured by papers across the country.

Leveraging new acquisitions on the backs of papers that are doing well has been a common woe among several big newspaper chains – including Lee Enterprises. It’s something of a “local” chain, and we’re sorry they’ve fallen victim to this trend.

We love newspapers and hope Lee is able to fend off its own demise. But the prognosis is not good.

Tough times for Gannett

Gannett Company is reportedly poised to cut more than 1,000 jobs (7/1/09) as it tries to overcome the financial woes of the current recession.

It’s not yet known how these massive cuts will impact the Sioux Falls Argus-Leader, the only Gannett newspaper in South Dakota.

A decade ago, Gannett – the largest newspaper company in the United States – employed some 41,000 workers. Including the imminent round of reductions, Gannett employees will number closer to 28,000.

A half century ago, journalist Paul Miller – an Oklahoman – headed the Gannett organization and helped it become the largest newspaper chain in America. Although I never met Paul Miller (no relation), I had the privilege of serving as KOSU General Manager/Assistant Professor for a few years in the Paul Miller School of Journalism and Broadcasting at Oklahoma State University. That was in the 1970s.

It was Oklahoma A & M University back in 1931 when Miller earned his degree in Stillwater. Born in Missouri, he spent much of his youth in Pawhuska, Oklahoma. Then, while attending A & M, he took a year off to work for the Okema Daily Leader. That's a young Paul Miller reviewing some copy in the photo at left.

Oklahoma State University has put together a nice collection of Paul Miller photographs/quotations. Despite his enormous success as a manager and leader in the newspaper and broadcasting business, he apparently considered himself first and foremost as a “reporter.” Reading through numerous quotes attributed to Paul Miller is inspiring. Had journalism not strayed from some of the principles embraced by Miller, I doubt that the industry would be in quite the pickle it is today.

Not that Miller – or his successor, South Dakotan Al Neuharth – could have staved off all the troubles facing the media in 2009. But I believe much of the media lost public trust long before the economic meltdown began late last year.

Miller and Neuharth are long gone from decision making at Gannett. Let’s hope that the principles advocated by Paul Miller will find followers in a new generation of journalists, motivating them to believe in and practice objectivity, fairness, and truth.

"SUBSTANCE ahead of Form;

BALANCE ahead of Speed;

COMPLETENESS ahead of Color;

ACCURACY ahead of everything. . ."

-- Paul Miller, September 18, 1965

Bank on it

Earlier this month, USA Today founder Al Neuharth visited the Great Plains Bank in his old hometown of Eureka, South Dakota. He apparently came away with a renewed understanding of the simple logic that seems to escape big city bankers: lending institutions should loan money only to the people who can afford what they’re buying and who will be able to repay the loan.

Neuharth wrote about this experience in Why our little banks don’t need bailouts.

With tons of taxpayer money now going to help bail out big banks that didn’t have the good sense to remain true to the above axiom, we’re confronted with another sad fact. Big banks are getting bigger, and their wallets will likely get fatter with our hard-earned tax monies that are simple subsidies.

We’ve railed about media consolidation, and there’s little reason to believe that huge bank consolidations are any less smelly. The last-minute takeover of ailing Wachovia Bank allows Wells Fargo to join Bank of America and JPMorgan Chase Bank as financial behemoths that will eventually stifle good local service. The corporate mentality of maximizing the bottom line at all costs will work to blur the judgment of these banks, and “local service banks” will become harder and harder to find.

Bank on it.