WaPo Revenues Fall

Washington-post-ALast week brought more bad news for the newspaper business, with the Washington Post Co. announcing that total revenues fell 7% from $1.04 billion in the first quarter of 2011 to $973 million in the first quarter of 2012, due to declines at its newspaper publishing and education divisions, while its cable TV division remained flat. Revenues increased at its broadcast TV division, but not enough to offset losses elsewhere.

Total revenues at the newspaper division sank 8% from $155 million to $142.3 million, with print ad revenues down 17% from $63.2 million to $52.7 million. Ad revenue declines were spread across all the major categories, including general, classifieds, and preprint. Online revenues fell 7% from $26.2 million to $24.2 million, due in part to an 11% drop in online display advertising and a 1% drop in online classifieds. Sunday circulation at the flagship newspaper fell 5.2%, while daily circ tumbled 9.8%.

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The company took an even bigger hit in its education division, including Kaplan, which over the last decade had grown to be the company’s largest and most lucrative business -- before legislative reforms tightened student loan policies and triggered a series of revenue declines continuing into the present. Total revenues at WaPo’s education division fell 11% from $619 million in the first quarter of 2011 to $553 million in the first quarter of 2012.

As noted, this is just the latest in a series of weak first-quarter results announced by big newspaper publishers in recent weeks. The New York Times Co. saw total advertising revenues slip 8.1% to $238 million. Gannett Co.’s publishing revenues declined 6% to $874 million in the first quarter of 2012. At A.H. Belo, which publishes the Dallas Morning News, total revenues fell 7% from $112.7 million in the first quarter of 2011 to $104.8 million in the first quarter of 2012.

Media General, the third-largest newspaper publisher, saw total revenues increase slightly, growing 0.4% to $150 million due to improved results from its broadcast TV stations and online properties. Total revenues at Lee Enterprises slipped 3.6% to $172.3 million. Journal Communications -- which publishes the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel among other newspapers -- said total revenues fell 1.9% to $82.3 million in the first quarter of 2012.

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