Gannett, Gatehouse talking merger

I do give TEGNA news stations some credit with trying to reinvent their newscasts, most markets have booted up a 30-min show with one of the anchors digging in to one local story that will take up most of the A block and brief in-person discussion with the reporter and ask for feedback. B block is a look at weather and some other top headline reads and then the C block is a rundown of some of the feedback on the story from the first block. The first few I've seen have been decent.
A much better use of resources than sticking someone out in the field until 11:08 p.m. so you can get a live shot to discuss a story that happened six hours earlier.

 

They want to revolutionize news with a newsroom full of 25-30 year olds and the managers in meetings all day. Our station had like half the staff of the No.1 station in town from what I recall. There were more managers than reporters.

I guess they're trying, but it's obviously not realistic.

 

Oh - I don't doubt that. But also realize Gannett hires so many managers so they can work them all hours without paying a nickel of OT. Had an assistant city editor who realized that I was making more per hour than she was given her schedule.

 

lars of cuts and that

In the conference call management said that they had made about 60 million dollars of the anticipated 300 million dollars of cuts had been made. So 20% down, 80% to go.

 

Yikes

 

Oh $#!7. I'm sorry I asked.

 

Their ultimate goal:

 

Were the $300m in cuts including anticipating continuing revenue declines or baselined against where they were at the time of the sale? You know what is really irritating - the company has sunk more than $500m in repurchasing stock in the last decade to boost the stock, that today sits at $4.25 a share (or less than the cost of a subscription, digital or otherwise).
Oh and the total market cap for the company as of Friday? $542m.

 

I am not sure. I don't even understand the arithmetic in the press releases. It does not seem to add up to my simple mind.

But the company says revenues are going to stabilize. They project revenue declines of 3.5% in 2020, two percent in 2022 and less than one percent in 2022. The CEO said they will replace lost print advertising revenue with additional digital revenue. So my understanding that the cost cuts are baselined to the time of the sale.

The company also said they are going to come up with a couple hundred million in digital revenues. Digital advertising declined last year and total digital circulation revenue is around 51 million so I don't see how this is going to happen.

Other items that I found interesting. The company paid out 88 million in cash last quarter.

1. They paid out 87.8 million dollars in pension benefits as a result of the merger. So there are some folks running with their feet. And I don't think that much cash went to the bottom portions of the org chart.

2. Every quarter they report a cash flow number that excludes reorganization costs as a non-recurring cost. But they reorganize every quarter and said they would do so for two more years. Reorganization costs are as much a continuing part of their business as the light bill.

3. At the end of the call the CEO thanked the employees after spending much of his presentation enthusiastically talking about how he is going to fire a couple thousand.

 

Meetings are such a waste of time. I hate meetings.

 

There are some meetings that simply could've been emails.

 

Exactly! Just tell me what the directive is and I’ll carry it out. Very simple. I don’t need some wasteful back and forth dialogue keeping me from getting my work done.

We had one recently where the managing editor and a reporter kept talking, talking, talking, asking question after question. Our photographer finally walked out and went to his desk do, you know, work. I was right right behind him. I asked him if he thought those two would ever shut up and he said not in our lifetimes.