Contrast these two recent news items:
“Google parent company [Alphabet] flexed its digital dominance, reporting its highest quarter ever for sales and profit behind a gusher of online advertising from businesses vying for customers across reopened economies,” reported the Wall Street Journal on July 28.
“It is with mixed feelings that I share the news that we are discontinuing publication of the Marion Times, effective at the end of this month. Our last publication day will be July 29, 2021. We will also be discontinuing the Marion Today monthly publication. As many of you know, it is a challenging time to be in the news media business. There is much competition for readers’ time and attention as well as advertising. In addition, some of the newspaper’s bread and butter advertising customers are under heavy pressure from online competitors. Specifically, Facebook, Google and Amazon have had direct, negative effects on newspaper revenue,” said Bob Woodward, vice president of Community Media at Woodward Communications in a statement last week.
This is not a good indicator for locally owned media.
It comes on the heels of Folience, The Gazette’s parent company, announcing that Color Web Printers, located on Bowling Street in Cedar Rapids, which has been printing The Gazette since the late 1990s, will be shut down. This closure includes the loss of 34 full-time employees and eight part-time employees.
“This was a tough decision because it affects our fellow employee-owners, many of whom are long-time employees,” said Folience CEO Daniel Goldstein in a press release. “But the changing economics and consolidation of the print industry necessitate this.”
Additionally, the Gazette has been stopping its porch delivery to some subscribers who don’t have a paper box at the end of their drive.
The Gazette will be printed in Des Moines beginning Aug. 26 and shipped to the region for distribution.
Some locally owned media companies have struggled over the past decade to adapt to a more digitally focused audience, and the pandemic has only exacerbated this economic imbalance.
So what can be done to prevent the further demise of locally-owned media companies, particularly in the print medium industry?
Our message is it isn’t too late to help. Be sure to subscribe and pay for a subscription to a newspaper (and business journal) and spend a portion of your marketing budget on locally owned media companies.
The Washington Post has an ominous but compelling tagline that says, “Democracy Dies in Darkness.” We agree and shudder to think how our local and regional communities will function without a viable local media apparatus. It’s not too late to help now.
