Can papers survive when competitors fall

[PatrickCarney]

What will the impact be on newspapers like the Denver Post when their main competitors fall? If the Tampa Trip falls, does the St. Pete Times survive?

Basically, can print papers survive if there is only one major paper per major market?

 

[rpmmutant]

There are a lot of one-paper towns. Big ones too. In California alone, I can think of San Diego and Sacramento. Portland, Ore., Phoenix, Salt Lake City. One-paper cities are the norm rather than the exception.

 

[John]

Most of us better hope so.

 

[playthrough]

St. Pete will survive without the Trib. For years it has boosted its presence in Tampa, trying to beat the Trib on its own turf. Soon, perhaps, it will just get the turf handed to them.

 

[Desk_dude]

Denver's situation is different than a place like Tampa because the Post was in a JOA with RMN.

The Post's circulation will nearly double. But expenses will drop. With just one paper, the press/platemaking operation will be diminished. Some fewer circulation and ad people. Plus there won't be the expense of the RMN newsroom.

In other markets, it should be even more beneficial. There will be more circulation and money to charge ads. And the expenses won't be that much greater.

The residents will suffer because there will be one less outlet for news.

 

[Desk_dude]

Yes, Dean will be cutting expenses along the way.

Just saw he plans to outsources the printing at the LA Daily News, which already was printing other papers in the chain. Being done by a company in Gardenia as well as the Orange County Register.

 

[deskslave]

There are a lot of one-paper towns. Big ones too. In California alone, I can think of San Diego and Sacramento. Portland, Ore., Phoenix, Salt Lake City. One-paper cities are the norm rather than the exception.

Salt Lake City?

 

[Stitch]

There are a lot of one-paper towns. Big ones too. In California alone, I can think of San Diego and Sacramento. Portland, Ore., Phoenix, Salt Lake City. One-paper cities are the norm rather than the exception.

Salt Lake City?

Salt Lake is a two newspaper town, and Provo and Ogden have three that compete for readers.

The East Valley in Phoenix is served by the East Valley Tribune, which dropped from being a daily recently.

 

[RickStain]

Two-paper towns are just the leading edge of the carnage. It'll hit the one-paper towns soon enough.

 

[slappy4428]

Denver's situation is different than a place like Tampa because the Post was in a JOA with RMN.

The Post's circulation will nearly double. But expenses will drop. With just one paper, the press/platemaking operation will be diminished. Some fewer circulation and ad people. Plus there won't be the expense of the RMN newsroom.

In other markets, it should be even more beneficial. There will be more circulation and money to charge ads. And the expenses won't be that much greater.

The residents will suffer because there will be one less outlet for news.

I disagree. I dont think you'll see circulation almost double. There are a lot of people who refuse to subscribe to paper A for one reason or another -- writing, political, hard on for the owner...
You assume because that's the only option for a paper that they'll opt to take a paper.
Post will see a bump but not close to double...

 

[DanOregon]

What will the impact be on newspapers like the Denver Post when their main competitors fall? If the Tampa Trip falls, does the St. Pete Times survive?

Basically, can print papers survive if there is only one major paper per major market?

There are a number of one-paper cities that are close to losing papers. San Francisco, Philadelphia (more or less). The lack of competition may even cause further losses as papers no longer feel the need to "compete," cut staffs, jack up ad rates and turn off more advertisers. Singleton is struggling and he's gobbled up the entire market between San Jose and Marin east to Sacramento.
I'd really like to see papers that suddenly find themselves without a competitor to jack up their product and hope the community realizes they they don't have another paper to spare.

 

[ArnoldBabar]

Denver's situation is different than a place like Tampa because the Post was in a JOA with RMN.

The Post's circulation will nearly double. But expenses will drop. With just one paper, the press/platemaking operation will be diminished. Some fewer circulation and ad people. Plus there won't be the expense of the RMN newsroom.

In other markets, it should be even more beneficial. There will be more circulation and money to charge ads. And the expenses won't be that much greater.

The residents will suffer because there will be one less outlet for news.

I disagree. I dont think you'll see circulation almost double. There are a lot of people who refuse to subscribe to paper A for one reason or another -- writing, political, hard on for the owner...
You assume because that's the only option for a paper that they'll opt to take a paper.
Post will see a bump but not close to double...

Agreed, no way does the surviving paper get anything close to the entire circ of the dead paper. Because of the reasons slappy mentioned and because it will remind most people that they don't really need the print paper anymore. A lot of people subscribe out of habit, and when confronted with change, and reminded of the cost, they'll just quit.

And JOA papers like the Post can actually be hurt by the competition closing. In Seattle, where the P-I is about to close, the Times handles printing, circulation and advertising with the P-I paying a percentage of the freight. When there were net losses, the owners of the P-I had to cut them a check to cover half of it. Now that check isn't coming anymore, and one company has to absorb the losses that used to be shared by two. Plus they absorb all the infrastructure costs -- the printing plant, delivery vehicles, etc.

They'll pick up some amount of advertising and subscription money, but probably will not come out ahead.

 

[deskslave]

There are a lot of one-paper towns. Big ones too. In California alone, I can think of San Diego and Sacramento. Portland, Ore., Phoenix, Salt Lake City. One-paper cities are the norm rather than the exception.

Salt Lake City?

Salt Lake is a two newspaper town, and Provo and Ogden have three that compete for readers.

The East Valley in Phoenix is served by the East Valley Tribune, which dropped from being a daily recently.

Indeed. And hard to imagine the Morning News going anywhere. The Tribune, I don't know. Doesn't seem to be one of those markets that you hear much about though, which is probably to its benefit.

 

[Mizzougrad96]

They should survive and thrive. They usually jack up the ad prices and companies have no choice but to play along.

Unfortunately what usually happens is they start cutting staff and stop spending money because when they have no competition, they tend to get complacent. It's one of the reasons why I always thought the three South Florida papers were all so good, because they had to rise to their competition. Same thing in Denver before the JOA.

 

[Mizzougrad96]

I worked at a paper where the competitor was having financial problems and they started traveling less as a result. Within a few weeks, the bean counters at our paper noticed we were traveling two more people each week for NFL games and we cut that number to what they were doing. At one point both papers were doing a special section each week and when they stopped, we stopped a few weeks later.

Good competition really brings out the best in a paper. Unfortunately, there are so few markets where that still exists.

 

[Stitch]

There are a lot of one-paper towns. Big ones too. In California alone, I can think of San Diego and Sacramento. Portland, Ore., Phoenix, Salt Lake City. One-paper cities are the norm rather than the exception.

Salt Lake City?

Salt Lake is a two newspaper town, and Provo and Ogden have three that compete for readers.

The East Valley in Phoenix is served by the East Valley Tribune, which dropped from being a daily recently.

Indeed. And hard to imagine the Morning News going anywhere. The Tribune, I don't know. Doesn't seem to be one of those markets that you hear much about though, which is probably to its benefit.

I haven't heard of any layoffs at the Trib. The D-News laid off a good number a while back, but still have a bigger newsroom than the Trib.