Tag: media business

Media Nation has obtained a memo that Boston Globe publisher Steve Ainsley e-mailed to his staff this evening. Here’s the full text:

To all Boston Globe employees —

I know the news over the weekend that highlighted the core issues presented to union leaders in a closed door meeting last week was jarring for all of you. It was certainly not our intention for you to learn of these preliminary discussions through reports in the Globe and other media but since this is how it has played out there are several important points of which you should all be aware.

As you all know by now, several members of the Globe executive team met with all our union leaders last week to review with them the Globe’s financial situation. It remains our standing policy that we never discuss ongoing labor negotiations publicly and we made that commitment to the leaders of all of our unions last week. For that reason I cannot provide more detail today. I can say that we explained that going forward we have to tackle major issues on both revenue and expense fronts and those individual strategies were shared with union leadership.

We will need significant concessions from labor and we are also framing a plan to draw more savings from the nonunion ranks, as we done over the course of the last several months. We also have a strategy in motion which will bring in additional revenue from consumers and advertisers. This plan was presented in some detail as we believed it appropriate to give union leadership a full view of all that is being done to achieve financial stability at The Boston Globe.

It is critical we all keep in mind our objective is to improve the financial performance of the Globe. Period. As bruising as this economic downturn has been to this institution, I believe we will accomplish that objective if all of us, every employee of the Globe, is able to keep our focus. Nothing less will prove successful.

Similarly, it is only fair that management also be prepared to make sacrifices. We have already reduced compensation 5% in 2009 and reduced the management work force by almost 20%. More work is to be done on this front and will be.

I continue to believe that our strength is in our common denominator — we are all employees of The Boston Globe. We have accomplished much in the last few years under difficult circumstances and that should give us all confidence that we can overcome this challenge.

Steve

The e-mail speaks for itself, but I do want to highlight this: “It was certainly not our intention for you to learn of these preliminary discussions through reports in the Globe and other media.”

Ainsley is the publisher of a newspaper. He is in the communications business. Not only has he fallen short in communicating with his employees, but it is mind-boggling to think that he really believed he could keep this a secret.

Over the weekend Paul Levy, the CEO of Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, sent out an e-mail to local bloggers asking that they take part in a “blog rally” aimed at underscoring the importance of keeping the Boston Globe in business.

As a journalist who covers the Globe, I declined to take part. But it’s an interesting idea. The posts started going up this evening. Here is Levy’s.

Universal Hub, like Media Nation, also declined to take part directly, but reports on the rally here, adding that some 20 bloggers are participating.

Mary Moore’s Boston Business Journal article on the fate of the Boston Globe is a must-read — a comprehensive overview of every idea that’s being floated, from the return of the Taylor family to the return of (good grief) Mike Barnicle. Of course, Rupert Murdoch and Pat Purcell have cameos, too.

And here’s a wrinkle to Moore’s suggestion that the non-profit Boston Foundation might get involved: vice president Mary Jo Meisner (photo) was editor of Community Newspaper Co. back when Fidelity owned it, running more than 100 papers in Eastern Massachusetts.

Meisner was also editor of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel and city editor of the Washington Post, among other newspaper jobs. It would be pretty interesting if the Globe’s financial woes somehow resulted in her returning to the journalism wars.

Michael Kinsley is in a sour mood today as he ponders the future of newspapers. Shorter Kinsley: Let ’em die. Slightly longer Kinsley: Non-profit, foundation-supported newspapers are a bad idea because if the marketplace won’t support them, then they have no right to exist.

Personally, I’m not wild about the idea of non-profit newspapers. For one thing, you have to give up some of your First Amendment rights. For another, there’s a danger that such papers, insulated from the pressures of the marketplace, will become too disconnected from their readers.

I prefer the St. Petersburg Times model: a for-profit newspaper owned by a non-profit organization — the Poynter Institute, in the Times’ case. The financial advantages aren’t as great as true non-profit status, but at least the editors don’t have to check with the IRS every time they want to weigh in on a political matter.

But gee, Mike, let a thousand experiments bloom. I’d like to see someone give non-profit newspapering a try. Maybe we can start with the Boston Globe.

And let me point out that public radio stations are pretty much all owned by non-profit foundations, and they are anything but disconnected from their listeners. Simply by having to solicit the bulk of their money from listeners, public radio station executives are perhaps more connected to their communities than many newspaper publishers and editors.

Finally: Kinsley is so far off in his observation that newspapers are dying because no one wants to read them that it’s hard to know where to begin. Do I really have to point out that newspaper readership is reasonably healthy when you add print and online readers together?

Just because it’s become a cliché to say that the business model is broken doesn’t mean it isn’t true.

I’m now hearing some gut-churning numbers from a reliable source about the Boston Globe’s advertising revenue. It will be fascinating to see the first-quarter financials for the New England News Group when the New York Times Co. files its next report with the SEC.

Jay Fitzgerald and I are both shaking our heads over the same thing: the New York Times Co.’s claim that the Boston Globe is on track to lose $85 million this year. By one measure, he notes, you’d have to lay off 1,200 of the paper’s 1,400 employees to close the gap. Does this make any sense? How is this even remotely possible?

Last December, when Tribune Co. declared bankruptcy under the weight of $13 billion in corporate debt, it was reported that its newspapers — which include the Los Angeles Times and the Chicago Tribune — were actually profitable, or would be if it weren’t for Sam Zell’s depredations.

What’s going on with the Times Co. and the Globe is the reverse. Not that the Times Co. is without debt. The issue, though, is not corporate debt, but actual operating losses in Boston.

According to a chart in yesterday’s Globe — I’m sure it’s in the Times Co.’s annual report, but why look it up when it’s right in front of me? — the revenues for the company’s New England Media Group (the Globe, the Worcester Telegram & Gazette and Boston.com) fell from $700 million in 2004 to $524 million in 2008.

The Globe accounts for the vast majority of those revenues. I fail to understand how a paper pulling in that kind of money — with a weekday circulation of about 325,000, a Sunday circulation of 500,000 or so, and more than 5 million unique Web visitors a month — can’t find a way to break even.

I’m not a financial guy, but to me, it just makes no sense.

So much for a decent interval. Just hours after the Boston Globe blew out its front page with the news that the New York Times Co. will shut the paper down if it can’t come up with $20 million in savings, the Globe has unveiled a print and television promotional campaign built around the theme of “One Story.”

A source passes this along, from the Globe’s internal Web site:

Globe launches new brand campaign

On Sunday the Globe will launch a new brand campaign that reinforces the value of the Globe’s journalism among our core readers. A TV commercial showcases the Globe’s award-winning photography while focusing on the compelling stories found in the Globe. The spots (60 sec. & 30 sec.) will initially run on NESN during the highly rated Red Sox games. More than 24 print ads were created to run in the Globe and Metro. On-line ads will run on Boston.com. The campaign also has a Web page with all the creative where readers or advertisers can find more information. The entire campaign was conceived and executed internally by our marketing and creative services teams.

Globe executives have got to keep moving forward, so in principle I’ve got no problem with this. But the timing is exceedingly odd, given the very public face-off now taking place between management and the unions.

Even better, the Globe has posted an angry story about reaction to the Times Co.’s ultimatum. One Story, you might say.

Newspaper analyst and blogger Alan Mutter argues that the New York Times Co.’s $20 million demand isn’t that big a deal, and that the Boston Globe may have hurt its prospects by playing up the story beyond its importance. He writes:

The story not only was vastly overplayed but also may serve to unnecessarily damage the newspaper’s already weakened business. The editors, who evidently let emotion overcome their news judgment, should have known better.

To which new-media advocate Jeff Jarvis replies: “Was this a negotiating move? Of course. But it’s a credible threat.”

And he’s got every right to.