Gannett, Gatehouse talking merger

This means that within a span of five years the Knoxville newspaper will have gone from Scripps to Journal Communications to Gannett to Gatehouse.

 

That's amazing. Can you imagine all the fricking paperwork for health care, etc? And dumb edicts?

 

Newsonomics: The GateHouse/Gannett newspaper megamerger could be announced as soon as tomorrow morning

 

I fear for every rank and file sort associated with both chains.

I mean, how are they going to pay all those executives, none of whom will be cut because both companies value them infinitely more than people who actually, you know, help get their product out to advertisers and readers.

 

I don't think the USA Today design desk will be shitcanned, but I'm guessing they're going to be told they can reapply for their jobs at what GateHouse pays, which is significantly less.

 

I wouldn't be so sure of that. There's no such thing as getting paid significantly less than Gannett pays.

 

What is Gannett's motivation for this? I know Gatehouse is the worst company around (barely beating some of the others) but what does Gannett get out of this? Why didn't Gannett just sell all its properties to Gatehouse for a lot of money? Why merge?

 

All Gannett suits can make a clean getaway. Golden parachutes ensue.

 

Gannett's shareholders and execs get a nice financial boost. Some execs stay on in new roles to help with the transition/oversight, rest get golden parachutes as Slacker said.

GateHouse presumably gets the properties at a cheaper price than it would get as an outright sale. By doing a merger, they likely get more help to make the transition courtesy of Gannett holdovers, which means less disruption to the GateHouse head honchos.

 

Because this is all the cash Gannett could get. Before the DFM merger rumors started Gannett stock was about $9. It bounced to $11 after the DFM offer, dropped to $8 after that fell through and has bounced back to $11. Gannett shareholders will get $6 a share, which is close to what the stock trades for absent takeover rumors.

And this appears to be a takeover by Gatehouse. They will run the new company. Last year Gatehouse made a profit of 19 million dollars. They lost 10 million dollars in the first quarter of this year. And their management is going to turn around Gannett.

 

Yes, there is. Just trust me on this. GateHouse pays almost $5K-$10K/year less for their design positions than Gannett.

And God help you if you're a design team lead. The pay cut will be even higher.

 

Gannett has already sold the Tysons building, right? If you work there, I’d be very, very, very nervous.