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Gannett changing name to USA Today Co.

M

Mediafrog+

The Gannett name was well known from its broadcasting+publishing incarnation, but this is technically a different company.

www.usatoday.com

Gannett enters a new era, company renamed USA TODAY Co.

Gannett Inc. is changing its name to USA TODAY Co., building on the company's legacy of innovation.
www.usatoday.com

In 2015 the legacy Gannett spun off its publishing arm into a new company, which took the Gannett name. The remaining legacy broadcast business was rebranded as TEGNA.

In 2019 Gatehouse, another publishing company, bought the “new” Gannett. The merged entity took the Gannett name, so you could say it was the “new new Gannett”.

Now the Gannett name is gone, as will be TEGNA when the Nexstar deal closes.
 
Mediafrog+ said:
The Gannett name was well known from its broadcasting+publishing incarnation, but this is technically a different company.

www.usatoday.com

Gannett enters a new era, company renamed USA TODAY Co.

Gannett Inc. is changing its name to USA TODAY Co., building on the company's legacy of innovation.
www.usatoday.com

In 2015 the legacy Gannett spun off its publishing arm into a new company, which took the Gannett name. The remaining legacy broadcast business was rebranded as TEGNA.

In 2019 Gatehouse, another publishing company, bought the “new” Gannett. The merged entity took the Gannett name, so you could say it was the “new new Gannett”.

Now the Gannett name is gone, as will be TEGNA when the Nexstar deal closes.
Click to expand...

How will the over 200 papers published by these people brand in the future-- will they now brand as something like "A USA Today Co. Publication" or similar?
 
fybush said:
The Gannett newspapers have been branding as "USA Today Network" for several years now. And most of them are already basically zombies with only a handful of local reporters (or none at all) and lots of national filler content.
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Correct. People talk about this happening at radio as though it's unique. It's not. It first hit newspapers, then radio, and it's starting to affect TV.

You can thank the internet for making local broadcasting (like local retail) obsolete.
 
TheBigA said:
Correct. People talk about this happening at radio as though it's unique. It's not. It first hit newspapers, then radio, and it's starting to affect TV.

You can thank the internet for making local broadcasting (like local retail) obsolete.
Click to expand...
You're welcome. (I take responsibility for my little part in destroying trad-media.)
 
KilowattKat said:
Or could those 200 papers all become *gasp* just local editions of USA Today?
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I thought they already are local versions of USA today when I go to some of the editions like Stockton Record, Redding Searchlight, Ventura County Star, Detroit Free Press and The Arizona Republic. They have articles that go directly to USA Today. When USA Today has articles in some parts of the country at least some of it is coming from their local editions. But I can also see the point that a company like USA Today Inc would focus more on national stories to compete against other national known newspapers like LA Times, Washington Post, New York Times and Wall Street Journal for readers.

If there are people complaining that there are less local news content those readers in some parts of the country donate to local news outlets that put more attention to local news like "The States Newsroom" or their local NPR and PBS affiliate for those or their statewide news outlet like Calmatters for the same issues. Or people that would have read a local newspaper thats directly affiliated with USA Today in the past have moved on to Patch and Hoodline because they emphasized on local news in their content.


statesnewsroom.com

Home • States Newsroom

Fair. Fearless. Free. The nation's largest state-focused nonprofit news organization, with reporting from every capital.
statesnewsroom.com statesnewsroom.com

calmatters.org

About Us CalMatters

CalMatters is dedicated to explaining California politics and policy through award-winning, nonpartisan journalism.
calmatters.org calmatters.org

patch.com

About Patch

Our best breaking news, stories, and events from the Patch network of local news sites
patch.com patch.com

Originally Reported, Hyperlocal Neighborhood News | Hoodline

Get breaking news from Hoodline's local reporters with stories to inform you about politics, weather, real estate, business, dining, crime, & more.
hoodline.com hoodline.com
 
bmasters1981 said:
How will the over 200 papers published by these people brand in the future-- will they now brand as something like "A USA Today Co. Publication" or similar?
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They are already doing this largely branding themselves 'Part of the USA Today Network'. This corporate name change wouldn't affect much to consumers of the papers as the change has effectively been executed there. The change makes sense.
 
umfan said:
They are already doing this largely branding themselves 'Part of the USA Today Network'. This corporate name change wouldn't affect much to consumers of the papers as the change has effectively been executed there. The change makes sense.
Click to expand...
I can see this going further, for example they could for most of their papers remove the newspaper name, and replace it with the USA Today logo, then underneath would say ,STOCKTON EDITION. It would be the USA Today national paper but with only one maybe two pages of local news sports and weather. I don't read USA Today, but is this how some of the papers are put together already? It would streamline the printing process, and highlight the national brand.
 
KilowattKat said:
I can see this going further, for example they could for most of their papers remove the newspaper name, and replace it with the USA Today logo
Click to expand...

Or do both. There's value in the local branding. That's really all that's left. If people want USA Today, then they don't need the local edition. Same with radio. There's value in the local branding. Cumulus discovered that when they tried to replace local branding with Nash.
 
KilowattKat said:
I can see this going further, for example they could for most of their papers remove the newspaper name, and replace it with the USA Today logo, then underneath would say ,STOCKTON EDITION. It would be the USA Today national paper but with only one maybe two pages of local news sports and weather. I don't read USA Today, but is this how some of the papers are put together already? It would streamline the printing process, and highlight the national brand.
Click to expand...
Yes I see what you mean it’s like when Paramount owned CBS affiliates are inside the CBS News app with local stories that go to CBS News itself. Or it’s like local Fox O&O’s their articles and in some cases their local newscasts during breaking news situations go through Live Now on Fox feed.
 
i wonder if the Gannett name will be revived for the post merger TEGNA/Nexstar company with USA Today Co. giving the name/trademarks over to the new post merger company of their former TV assets.
 
Will_H_69_9 said:
i wonder if the Gannett name will be revived for the post merger TEGNA/Nexstar company with USA Today Co. giving the name/trademarks over to the new post merger company of their former TV assets.
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Why would they do that? Gannett doesn't have any real meaning in a TV context, and Nexstar is a well established brand that Sook has no reason to drop. Plus the rights to the Gannett name didn't go to Tegna at all.

Nor is there any reason why the USA Today group would ditch its local brands. People in Columbus (at least in older demos) still value the Columbus Dispatch brand, even if the actual paper is a shell of what it used to be. Same with the Record in NJ, or the Arizona Republic, or a hundred other local brands around the country. In some of these cases, the local brand is pretty much all that's left of any value, since the news operation itself has been hollowed out into oblivion.

That said, much of Gannett is a weird branding mess. Many of the local operations have a digital brand that's separate from the print brand - so for instance, the papers in suburban Boston operate digitally as wickedlocal.com, but in print they're the MetroWest Daily News, the Milford Daily News, and a bunch of other names.

Some of the print editions are down to just a few thousand readers at this point, and many are printed on early deadlines at sites many hours away from their own market. The Democrat and Chronicle here in Rochester prints in New Jersey, more than five hours away, and everything in it is at least a day and a half old by the time it arrives here. There are also situations where there are different nameplates atop identical content. The Herald News in Passaic County NJ is identical to the Record in the rest of North Jersey.

If they still cared, or had the staffing to care, they'd clean some of that up - but not by just rebranding everything as "USA Today" and killing the local brands that are still of value.
 
KilowattKat said:
Or could those 200 papers all become *gasp* just local editions of USA Today?
Click to expand...
The county where I live had two papers. One was relatively new and I think weekly. The other has been around for more than a century if you count mergers of competing papers.

Then the two papers merged. There is less local news and it turns out the other paper was the local edition of a statewide paper, And there's lots of state, national and international news.
 
KilowattKat said:
KilowattKat said:
I can see this going further, for example they could for most of their papers remove the newspaper name, and replace it with the USA Today logo, then underneath would say ,STOCKTON EDITION. It would be the USA Today national paper but with only one maybe two pages of local news sports and weather. I don't read USA Today, but is this how some of the papers are put together already? It would streamline the printing process, and highlight the national brand.
Click to expand...
Click to expand...
I could see something like that happening, at least in some markets. It could be regarded as an effort to refresh the brand and possibly attract new readership under the guise that it's a 'new' product.
 
TheBigA said:
Correct. People talk about this happening at radio as though it's unique. It's not. It first hit newspapers, then radio, and it's starting to affect TV.

You can thank the internet for making local broadcasting (like local retail) obsolete.
Click to expand...
True especially where we are now. I remember in another case Alden Media got scapegoated for how they managed newspapers from Chicago Tribune to Vallejo Times Herald to the Los Angeles Daily News.

 


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