“Don’t ask me exactly when it’s coming,” Wirth said. “But I believe we have a winning editorial proposition. I’m very confident that our editorial voice and that the community we’ve created among our audience allows us to create a weekly that can address our mission, and expand it when the market turns around.”
Several reports early Wednesday said that the company was closing its 40,000 circulation daily paper in favor of a weekly edition. Worth said the re-launched Daily Deal will focus on news. The weekly, which has not been named yet, will contain more in-depth stories and delve into more financial categories. The Deal focuses on mergers, acquisitions and financing. Its circulation also focuses on players in those businesses.
Although the financial services category has been hurting so far this year, Worth says The Deal’s revenue is up slightly. “I won’t tell you it’s not rough out there,” he said. “But I can tell you that we’ve expanded our account base. I can also tell you that we have strong renewal rates with our advertisers. I think we do it by providing a unique community and a high-end audience. And we put up a strong effort. We have a lot of hungry, scrappy people here.”
The Deal’s daily website may add new subscription products as the company reconfigures its editorial approach. The website has 100,000 unique monthly users.