Steve Cavendish begs Gannett to sell Tennessean

I wasn't going to say anything originally, but now that Henry did... I feel the same way if Gore bought the paper, although he does have deep pockets.

 

What's wrong with Gore buying it? The paper's somewhat liberal as is. Your political feelings may be a little unreasonable wihen you think Gannett -- fucking Gannett -- ownership is a better option than some other option.

 

Al Gore, or the Koch brothers, either one, would be better options than Gannett.

 

The way Gannett has centralized and outsourced operations, presses, copy desks, customer service at some places - I don't know if many of their individual papers have much worth at all. The next owner in some cases will have to spend more to make a newspaper function as a standalone than he would on the purchase itself.

 

And let's bring back the Nashville Banner while we're at it.

 

It will be interesting to see what Gannett does going forward. Do they continue with a cost-cutting strategy? Do they try to add value to the product to increase revenue? Do they shift their efforts away from newspapers to something else? Do they throw in the towel and do a massive sell-off (like Knight-Ridder)?

 

Nothing to do with politics, Dooley. I happen to think there are other people with deep pockets out there that would do a better job. I know Warren Buffett would likely, but he doesn't invest in bigger metro dailies and I doubt he would swoop in and buy Gannett's print products lock, stock and barrel.

 

I miss Peaches.

 

I got a dollar that says Gannett sells its Middle Tennessee group in the next year.

Gannett owns every single daily newspaper, and every weekly paper from the Tennessee River to the Cumberland Plateau with the exception of the Nashville Scene and the little daily in Cookeville.

Throw Jackson in the deal, and you'd have a huge area, that would dominate local news and advertising.

These new newspaper barons are looking for dominant news franchises and the Middle Tennessee group is it, they're dominant by default.

 

Lebanon Democrat, in my mom's hometown. Owned by Sandusky (!) Newspapers.