• by Wayne Friedman , October 21, 2013

Gannett Co.’s television revenue took a tumble in the third quarter due to unfavorable comparisons that included Olympics and political advertising of a year ago.

Television revenue sank nearly 15% to $198.5 million. Excluding Olympics and political business, the company says TV revenues would have climbed 13.6% -- which was anticipated by Gannett. Retrans revenues were up 62.8%.
Total broadcasting revenues, which included its out-of-home Captivate business, sank 14.2% to $203.4 million.

The company expects total television revenues for the fourth quarter of 2013 to be down in the “high teens” percentage -- also due to unfavorable comparisons to a year ago that included high political advertising.

Gannett Co. would become a much bigger TV company, as it agreed in June to buy the Dallas-based Belo Corp., a deal valued at $2.2 billion.

Overall, Gannett witnessed a 4% drop in third-quarter revenue to $1.25 billion from continued declining newspaper advertising sales, mainly at its newspaper properties. Publishing revenue specifically lost 3.6% to $858.1 million.

Company-wide digital revenue has seen growth of 12.4%, now comprising 30% of total revenue --- $376.1 million compared to $334.6 million a year ago.

Net income was cut in half --  $79.7 million versus $133.1 million for the same quarter last year .