As I watch Gannett in my hometown spring up new local print publications that seemingly step on each others’ toes, I have to step back and look at the newspaper landscape and wonder how much longer they will survive. I guess when you are a $7 billion company, it takes awhile for you to die. But at their monthly burn rate and deteriorating base of customers, it might be accellerated.

Reason 1: Cities Get Bigger, Local Gets Smaller
Indianapolis is a city of just over 1 million people. Thanks to unigov back in the early 70’s, all of Marion County is considered Indianapolis. The growing suburbs, or as Gannett sees it “where the money is at with advertisers”, is in Hamilton County to the north, just past the Indianapolis city limits. With 400 square miles to cover in Marion County (Indianapolis) plus the additional 400 square miles in Hamilton County (Fishers, Carmel, Noblesville, and Zionsville), let’s just say the word “local” doesn’t apply when you are trying to appeal to that much area with that many people.

The Indianapolis Star has had a lock on the newspaper space for years. Their readership is around 250,000 daily and 350,000 Sundays, both of which have been on a decline since the mid 90’s. But when Gannett came in and bought the family-owned Indy Star in 2000, the beginning of the end of an era began in my opinion.

Reason 2: Spreading Resources Too Thin
First of all, I believe they are spreading themselves way too thin. Let’s take their stable of publications for a city of 1 million+:

  • Indianapolis Star: daily and Sunday
  • Fishers Topics: weekly freebie in Hamilton County
  • Lawrence Topics: Fishers Topics with some Lawrence Township stories on front page
  • Fishers/Geist Magazine: 6x-year magazine mailed to $100,000+ households in area, sold on newsstands
  • Carmel Magazine: same as Geist/Fishers but neighboring area in Hamilton County only
  • The Noblesville Ledger: Weekly newspaper in Hamilton County
  • Carmel Star: weekend tabloid in Hamilton County
  • Fishers Star: another weekend tabloid just launching
  • INtake: another weekend tabloid aimed at 20-somethings looking for bar coupons distributed all over Indianapolis, Hamilton County
  • Indy Herald Weekly: Just purchased last year, a weekly newspaper that overlaps the Topics in some areas, but serves more urban communities in Indianapolis

…and the list of specialty publications goes on, and on, and on.

Indy Star staff writers are now being pulled in many directions to cover all types of articles, many of which are repurposed in multiple publications. From a branding perspective, having multiple brands in a market is difficult, especially on the sales staff. From an advertisers’ perspective, they don’t know who to call, how to get ahold of them, and they are a bit intimidated by the size (and sometimes pushiness) of their sales staff.

Reason 3: Newspaper Readers Aren’t Interactive
My second point is that the Indianapolis Star is a newspaper, not an interactive channel of wannabe journalists anxious and willing to post comments, editorial, or stories on their websites. Newspapers have been around for centuries doing one thing: being read. Now, these newspapers, thanks to the Internet, think that if they put up a website that people will come in droves to post comments and give their two cents. Wrong. Look at the demographics of print newspapers:

  • 57% male
  • 71% of 65 year-olds or older are their best readers
  • 40% of 18-24 year olds read the papers, their worst demographic

How many 65 year-old males do you know that are blogging, posting messages on myspace, chatting on AIM, or “interacting” with websites period? They have opinions, they are affluent, and they read newspapers because that’s all they ever had before the Internet. But thinking that they will 1) read a newspaper article, 2) go online on a computer and 3) post a comment or write story is a joke.

Remember, newspaper journalists are paid to report on what they see. People expect that of a newspaper, we’ve all been trained to think that way. Why on earth would I write a story for the newspaper? Here’s a hint Gannett. How many “Letters to the Editor” do you get now as a percent of your circulation? Take that percentage and divide it by 10 to get a realistic idea of how many online contributions you will receive. “Grandpa Don’t Do MySpace”.

Reason 4: Classifieds Are Free Everywhere Else
Publications like mine are printing (yes, the very medium that I’m bashing) classified ads for free for local communities. We also provide free online ads for residents, just as CraigsList.com. Newspapers have lived on classified ads for years, and now this base is eroding thanks to free classified websites and publications. Tribune posted their earnings report the other day and they admitted that “nearly 80% of their online revenues” come from classified ads. Print classifieds account for 34% of Tribune’s revenues and 50% of their profits. Makes selling display ads a little more important, doesn’t it? Hiring salespeople to call on businesses for space ads that are sold by the column inch vs. having Joe Public call and give Mary Jo a credit card over the phone is a different universe.

Reason 5: Mutiny on the Ship
Imagine yourself as a highly trained, always could make more newspaper journalist. Your flagship company is now telling you “hey, we are going to start publishing local news and comments from Joe Public in our newspaper!” Wouldn’t you think to yourself, “wait a minute, if they fill the paper with Joe’s stuff, they won’t need MY stuff!” Remember, Gannett’s corporate reign was a huge adjustment, one in which several editors were fired and positions consolidated. Mom and Pop Star are gone. Several old-timers took a retirement package. This new regime has already over-spiked the Kool Aid and now they are substituting their own staff’s work with free online content. When the layoffs start, watch what happens on the already strapped staffs of each of these publications.

My dad used to tell me a joke when I was a kid. “How do you kill fleas on a dog? You pour sand and a bottle of whiskey on your dog’s back. The fleas drink the whiskey, get in a rock fight, and kill each other”. I’m sure the editors at Gannett have a hidden bottle of whiskey somewhere in the employee lounge.