Next up: Chicago Tribune

How? Readers have never paid for the full cost of a newspaper. Why would they start now? Where are the smart people lining up to invest and bring back papers to their 2005 staffing levels?

 

Is the Gazette a Phil Anschutz investment?

 

I think that's the way to go. I use the online portion of our local paper a lot, but probably two or three times a week I go through the e-edition. Why? Because I've done it my entire life. That's why.

 

Suit yourself.

 

It's too late now. The ship has sailed.

 

That's not what you said. You claimed readers would economically support newspapers if the product was the same as 15 years ago. Not true. Readers, in general, won't support a newspaper at the cost it would require.

 

I'm just saying it's way too late to return to the way it was. First of all, most printing presses are GONE. Yes I believe newspapers would thrive if they had not turned into worthless pieces of trash. For the price? You'd have to be a fool to buy a newspaper. There is a market for a 12 page daily sports section, 18 pages on Sundays with all the baseball stats, all the box scores, features, things like outdoors coverage and the like. There's always a market for high school sports; relatives will always want to read about their kids and kids friends. Of course there's a market for that. But it's too late. Again, even the printing presses are gone except at a few locations.

 

If there is a market, why aren't people producing the product?

 

You have no understanding of how the business works. Back when newspapers were thriving 30 years ago, 1) 50-60 percent of revenue came from classified ads. Craigslist swallowed up all of that. 2) 30-40 percent of revenue came from print ads. Businesses moved away from buying print ads because technology changed and business can do their own advertising through social media, etc. for pennies on the dollar compared to buying print ads. 3) 10-20 percent of revenue came from subscriptions/circulation. That’s basically all you’d be left with if you stuck it out with print and didn’t look to make revenue from online. The money to pay journalists dried up because the business model didn’t change with the times.

The technology that we have now (because it’s 2021, not 1991) allows us to see that there really isn’t that big of a market for high school sports. There’s actually a pretty finite number of relatives interested in reading about their kids and kids’ friends. But those people who are interested tend to be willing to pay for that content, so newspaper companies need to cash in by getting as much money from them as possible.

Until someone comes up with a business model that can generate enough revenue to be profitable in the 21st century, the only way newspapers are going to stay alive will be through further consolidation to cut costs.

If people spent less time complaining about change and more time embracing it, maybe we’d actually have some hope.

 

I respect your post but I've heard too much b.s. from suits and suits' consultants -- stuff that's the flavor of the day -- and none of it has stuck. All I've learned is it pays to be a loudmouthed know it all consultant and make some money off newspaper suits. The stuff they've come up with through the years is hilarious.