• by Erik Sass  @eriksass1, November 2, 2007

Print advertising revenue at the Washington Post's flagship newspaper tumbled 13% in the third quarter compared to the same period in 2006--to $113.1 million, according to the company's earnings report released Thursday. Overall, the Washington Post Company's profits fell 1% to $72.2 million in the third quarter. However, losses in the newspaper division were offset somewhat by growth in its educational publishing and cable TV businesses. Altogether, the company's combined year-to-date revenues are up 7% to $3.05 billion, largely on the strength of these two businesses.

The gloomy results from the newspaper division contained a familiar mix of bad news resembling other newspaper companies' third-quarter results. The classified ad categories are suffering major losses, as job recruitment leads the way with a 27% drop.

Online revenue from the newspaper division grew 11% to $27.2 million--but as with other major newspaper publishers, this is a lower rate of growth than previous quarters. In the third quarter of 2006, online revenue grew 24% to $24.5 million. In absolute dollar terms, that's growth of just $2.7 million in 2007, versus $5.88 million in 2006.

In addition to the ad revenue losses, the Washington Post Company's newspaper division also posted a drop of approximately 4% in circulation revenues. For the year to date, average daily circulation at the Post was 638,800 on weekdays, and 905,300 for the Sunday edition.