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More Tampa Tribune cutbacks?

Discussion in 'Journalism topics only' started by reformedhack, Nov 3, 2014.

  1. LanceyHoward

    LanceyHoward Well-Known Member

    I don't think this deal is the catalyst. The catalyst was when the Tribune sold the printing plant to developers.

    I was surprised that circulation was not combined. Co-production and overlapping circulation areas would seem to make that idea economically attractive.

    Another thread indicates that the Times has lost 100,0000 subscribers in the past two years. Does anyone have any idea what the subscription of the Tribune is?

    Also, if the recent CJR article is correct that staff is down to approximately 40 how much of a product do they put out? I think the Tribune needs content sharing.

    I think a JOA is coming. And the weaker paper usually dies in such an arrangement.
     
    Last edited: Feb 9, 2016
  2. playthrough

    playthrough Moderator Staff Member

    I wish the Times would print one edition of the Tribune backwards and upside down, just to pretend it's the height of the old rivalry days and -- zing -- they win (speaking as a Times alum). But I'm guessing there's something in the fine print of the deal preventing that.
     
    HanSenSE likes this.
  3. reformedhack

    reformedhack Well-Known Member

    You seem to have an interest in, and many opinions about, this market and the two papers. Are you a local? With all due respect, some of your posts over the past couple of years have seemed more about academic expectations and assumptions than anything based in a hands-on understanding of this market, particularly the geographic differences that still divide it (albeit less so than in the past). If you are a local, glad to have you here ... but I don't get the impression that you are. Of course, I could be wrong about that. Why the interest, and what informs your assumptions?
     
  4. reformedhack

    reformedhack Well-Known Member

    I know there have been some fears expressed in the Tribune newsroom about such sabotage or content theft (especially if the Trib gets stuck with an early press run, as is possible). You can be sure that kind of stuff will be policed as much as possible, though.

    As an aside, I have heard that the Trib's press employees have been encouraged to apply for jobs at the Times once the Trib no longer needs their services, so that's some good news.
     
  5. BDC99

    BDC99 Well-Known Member

    And LH, the Trib didn't just "sell the printing plant to developers." It sold a very valuable piece of waterfront property in a potentially booming downtown area that was also much too large for the current staffing. The savings on utilities alone will be a big boost.
     
    reformedhack likes this.
  6. LanceyHoward

    LanceyHoward Well-Known Member

    Not a local. Just interested in the newspaper business.

    And I am sure you are correct that Tampa and St. Petersburg serve separate markets with separate interests, etc. But I am skeptical if those divergent interests can lead to a sufficient demand to support two papers in the market in this economic environment.

    One reason for this is that I am a former resident and frequent visitor to the Washington area. The Maryland and Virginia suburbs around D.C. are also two very different places. Residents rarely travel into the other state because of the traffic challenges. Both the Maryland and Northern Virginia sides of the river have income levels that are about the highest in the country. The suburban Northern Virginia paper I subscribed to 20 years ago (and who's name I forgot) is long gone. Berkshire also just closed the Manassas paper. Why should the Tampa area be able to economically support two large, daily newspapers if the larger, more affluent Washington area does not?

    In fact, if you look at the Tribune company eliminating their dividend this week it is beginning to look like some markets might not support one. As someone who on the road today and bought three newspapers that saddens me. But that's what I think.
     
  7. playthrough

    playthrough Moderator Staff Member

    It's an interesting question. I haven't been in the Tampa Bay market for 10 years but when I was, during a few of the glory years of the rivalry, I knew that most Tampa readers would just as soon go without a paper then take the Times, and vice versa with St. Pete and the Trib. Surely some of that sentiment still exists.
     
    reformedhack likes this.
  8. reformedhack

    reformedhack Well-Known Member

    It's still true. Not as much as it used to be, but it's still largely true.

    During those glory days, though ... man, it was a great newspaper war. Those who fought in it still can't fathom what's happening today. From the late 1980s to the early 2000s, readers on both sides of the bay were the real winners as both papers tried to outdo each other. Huge projects, strong investigation series, big national event coverage, special sections, the works.

    The last decade or so, though, it's been like South Korea vs. North Korea — occasionally taking shots at each other but not really fighting. Sometimes, one of them will launch a missile, and the other will hold war games along the 38th parallel, but nothing ever really results from it.

    I won't suggest which paper is north and which is south, but each has its own constituency. And the analogy isn't completely apt — because unlike those two countries, you don't have an oppressed population trying to cross the DMZ — but you get my general thrust.

    Also, I believe General Thrust led the U.N. troops during the 1950 battle at Inchon.
     
  9. BDC99

    BDC99 Well-Known Member

    The political leanings of the papers are also still a major selling point, depending on your POV. The Times is obviously liberal, while the Tribune is growing more conservative by the day. And, yeah, there aren't the resources to fight it out the way they used to.
     
    reformedhack likes this.
  10. reformedhack

    reformedhack Well-Known Member

    Indeed. The Tribune's editorial pages have been conservative throughout its history, but they had been moving more centrist in the early 2000s. I think the shift back to the right is both a philosophical choice as well as an orchestrated move to offer a counterpoint to the historically left-leaning Times editorial pages, thinking it might win some readers in the Times' back yard, where the population is a bit older.

    That's about as heated as the war gets anymore.
     
  11. Batman

    Batman Well-Known Member

    I thought he was the star of the hit film, "A*S*S"
     
    reformedhack likes this.
  12. LanceyHoward

    LanceyHoward Well-Known Member

     
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