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Cox selling Palm Beach Post, Austin American-Statesman

Discussion in 'Journalism topics only' started by BTExpress, Oct 31, 2017.

  1. Slacker

    Slacker Well-Known Member

    I had hoped the Cox family, being private owners worth billions and having lucrative business divisions elsewhere, would have kept its newspapers to preserve their integrity and local news value. Nobody likes losing money, but maybe those papers could have been kept as loss leaders or whatever. And that Austin waterfront location is positioned to be the hottest property in town when it goes up for sale, so there's a couple hundred million dollars or so that could have offset corporate newspaper losses for years after moving the Austin newsroom to a cheap strip mall or whatever.

    Cox had only four big papers -- Austin, Atlanta, WPB and Dayton -- plus the Palm Beach Daily News and assorted smaller papers in Ohio and Texas, so it's hard to see the four big papers dumped off to GateHouse. I wonder how much the newspaper losses at the four biggies cut into the overall Cox Enterprise profits each year, and if that could have been absorbed for the greater good, blah blah blah ...

    So, yeah hooey, just a daydream, but those were four good papers still, and the Cox family and heirs are set for life anyway.
     
    Bronco77 likes this.
  2. Bronco77

    Bronco77 Well-Known Member

    For many of the same reasons, I was surprised when Cox decided to put Austin and Palm Beach on the market. Unlike Gannett and McClatchy, Cox is a privately-owned company that doesn't have to show a certain profit margin for stockholders. Unlike Tronc, it's diversified and isn't a one-trick pony that is betting its future on revenue from struggling newspapers and looney-tune digital initiatives. By all accounts, Cox as a whole remains strong and quite profitable. The newspapers might have been marginally profitable at best, but probably not hemorrhaging red ink.

    But I think the landscape there really changed when Kim Guthrie took over as Cox's president last summer and decided to make some big changes. The memo in which she announced the American-Statesman and Post were being put up for sale and "exciting times" (translation: deep job cuts) were ahead told me all I needed to know about her.
     
    Last edited: Mar 8, 2018
  3. LanceyHoward

    LanceyHoward Well-Known Member

    I think that Palm Beach and Austin have been put up for sale before. The Cox family is selling the Austin real estate separately. That may have been the motivation to get finally get rid of the paper given the amount of cashthat land can bring in the current Austin reals estate market.

    The Cox family lives in Atlanta and I believe they are basically royalty in that town. They are going to hold on to Atlanta. The Cox chain was started in Dayton in 1891 by James Cox, who was later governor of Ohio and the Democratic nominee for President in 1920. I don't see the Cox's selling that paper for emotional reasons.
     
  4. da man

    da man Well-Known Member

    I don't know how great Cox is doing overall. I know Cox Automotive last year lost a bunch of money, cut bonuses and laid off a bunch of people late in the year.
     
  5. Bronco77

    Bronco77 Well-Known Member

    And who knows, maybe Cox's TV stations aren't all that profitable anymore either as people "cut the cord." Hard to say exactly what's going on with a privately-held company that isn't obligated to provide earnings reports. One thing for sure is that the family that owns the company won't be destitute anytime soon.
     
  6. bevo

    bevo Member

    Cox has been cutting and cutting for quite awhile now. I lost out on a job in West Palm Beach a few years ago after they decided to cut the position I interviewed for.
     
  7. Slacker

    Slacker Well-Known Member

    See, that is what was frustrating. Cox family was pretty flush with cash, but all of a sudden, in 2014 and 2015, they started hacking jobs in clusters as if they had the burden of shareholders on their backs. But they didn't.
     
  8. LanceyHoward

    LanceyHoward Well-Known Member

    I have thought about this. Gatehouse has not closed many papers. I think I should have said Gatehouse induces a coma upon purchase. ;)
     
    Last edited: Mar 9, 2018
  9. InTheKnow22

    InTheKnow22 New Member

  10. Slacker

    Slacker Well-Known Member

    “We are so grateful to the talented team in Palm Beach for their relentless execution of quality journalism and service to the community,” said Kim Guthrie, president of Cox Media Group. “When selecting a buyer for both papers, we sought a company that would build on their role as trusted local brands. We know The Post will make GateHouse proud.”

    Oh, puke. LOL, whatever.
     
  11. Bronco77

    Bronco77 Well-Known Member

    ASSuming GateHouse employs its scorched-earth philosophy, this is arguably one of the hardest landings for a once-excellent newspaper since the industry's decline began. Until 10 years ago, the Post certainly was one of the best papers of its size nationally, maybe THE best. I don't think Monday-through-Saturday circulation ever topped 200,000 as an annual average, but it was journalistically competitive with (and often superior to) the larger papers to the south. If you wanted to put in a few years there and move up, it was fertile recruiting territory for the Washington Post, New York Times, etc. If you decided to stay, you'd be rewarded. Veteran reporters on prominent beats often earned close to six figures, and experienced designers and copy editors brought in $70K and more. And those investments translated into quality.

    The one thing for sure is that the end is very near for what's left of the West Palm Beach portion of Cox's central desk, which will cease to exist as soon as the sale closes. A handful of people from that desk are to be absorbed by the Post after the sale, but how safe can their jobs be with GateHouse running the show?
     
    Last edited: Mar 29, 2018
  12. SFIND

    SFIND Well-Known Member

    Word around the area the last couple of weeks is Cox is shopping their Ohio papers.
     
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