I feel for my friends in Greensboro tonight.
The Virginian-Pilot has a story announcing that the Batten family is looking to sell Landmark Communications, which owns the Greensboro newspaper. I can’t say it’s a surprise. I wondered if they weren’t looking toward a sale several times over the last two years — I worked there — witnessing how deeply the staffs were cut. There was a large layoff in Greensboro in June, that came on the heels of a buyout of older employees and several years worth of staff trimming through attrition. Similar things, minus the layoff, were happening in Roanoke and Norfolk.
What surprises me is that the whole company, including the mothership, is being put on the block. I thought they might divest themselves of the newspapers but hang on to the cable outlets.
Either way, it’s a sad day for North Carolina to lose a long-time publisher who has been a good steward (until the aforementioned staff cuts) of the state’s third-largest newspaper. For my friends at all the papers, I hope this time of uncertainty is short. For the sake of good journalism, I hope the company can find a suitable buyer who won’t continue to ransack the news department for the sake of high profit margins.
3 Comments
January 3, 2008 at 1:36 pm
Nobody seems too panicked here.
Or they’re hiding it well.
I’m sort of shaky and weak, but I keep telling myself that’s my cold.
January 3, 2008 at 2:15 pm
I’m glad folks are handling it OK.
I imagine it’s a little less shocking following on the heels of the layoffs.
January 3, 2008 at 2:48 pm
[...] not as though it’s a huge shock. As former N&R reporter Jonathan Jones points out at his blog, the company has been doing things that looked conspicuously like polishing up for a sale for some [...]
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