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WashPost Loses $77 Million

T

TheBigA

This is an interesting story in the context of radio company losses. The Washington Post, owned by Jeff Bezos, lost $77 million last year according to its new CEO. As a result, he fired the paper's editor, and replaced her with someone else. He introduced the new editor to employees today. That's when he informed them of the financial situation:


At a turbulent staff meeting Monday, Lewis said it would be “nuts” to continue doing business as it has been done. He pointed to the losses the paper has endured of late — $77 million last year, by his account, leading to layoffs of nearly 13% of staff during 2023.

“We are going to turn this thing around, but let’s not sugarcoat it: it needs turning around,” Lewis said. “We are losing large amounts of money. Your audience is halved. People are not reading your stuff. I can’t sugarcoat it anymore.” While praising the integrity of The Post’s news reporting, Lewis also ripped the paper’s handling of social media.
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apnews.com

Sally Buzbee steps down as executive editor of The Washington Post

Sally Buzbee has stepped down after three years as executive editor of The Washington Post, one of journalism's most storied brands.
apnews.com apnews.com
 
TheBigA said:
This is an interesting story in the context of radio company losses. The Washington Post, owned by Jeff Bezos, lost $77 million last year according to its new CEO. As a result, he fired the paper's editor, and replaced her with someone else. He introduced the new editor to employees today. That's when he informed them of the financial situation...
Click to expand...
Usually, when a company loses half its customers – in this case, subscribers, but one could also reasonably ask how many advertisers and column inches of ads they've lost in the same time frame – the CEO walks the plank, not just the chief content officer. That would be Jeff Bezos. Anyone care to wager on how many days the principal owner is going to wait for the CEO to take responsibility? (And please don't tell me the CEO already walked the plank. Ms. Buzbee was the Exec Editor, equivalent to a Chief Content Officer in broadcasting. We all know who owns the paper and calls the shots. And IMHO, Mr. Bezos will never ever ever take responsibility for his own failures as an owner/CEO. IMO, of course.)
 
Weiserguy said:
Mr. Bezos will never ever ever take responsibility for his own failures as an owner/CEO. IMO, of course.)
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Bezos is not the CEO. According to the linked article, the CEO & publisher is Will Lewis, who I quoted in my previous post.

Owners never take responsibility. That's what they hire CEOs to do.
 
There's more complexity to the story than this thread has indicated up to this point. The Post article covers it reasonably well though I bet those three reporters assigned to it were rather uncomfortable: https://wapo.st/4c3hiEV

What it looks like to me:
  • New publisher wants to reorganize functions (because that's what new executives do, whether or not it's absolutely necessary...it makes it look like action is being taken).
  • Executive editor views it as demotion, even as she's asked to take charge of one of the new divisions. Possibly publisher expects executive editor to reject the idea. Such things have been known to happen.
  • Publisher and executive editor can't come to an agreement. Likely this is because of the next item.
  • Publisher reaches out to his network (I won't say Old Boy Network but I sure think it), finds replacements, and develops a timetable to execute personnel changes.
  • Executive editor and publisher continue to disagree. Of course, publisher has the last word. Actually, Bezos does, but I'm sure he's been advised on what's going to happen next.
  • Announcement is sudden and unsettles staff. We're talking about a newsroom, after all, and newsrooms are not the place to go if you wish to seek tranquility.
  • Staff...reporters, etc....have significantly different view of success than publisher and his new acolytes. Conflict is all but certain. It will be interesting to see if this affects the product, either positively or negatively.
In short, these are the usual high-level corporate machinations as applied to a journalistic environment. Seats are shuffled but life is likely to go on as before until the new guy's grand plans don't shake out and he and his crew sail on to another shore.
 
Mark Roberts said:
Staff...reporters, etc....have significantly different view of success than publisher and his new acolytes. Conflict is all but certain. It will be interesting to see if this affects the product, either positively or negatively
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This is the one item on your list that caught my attention. In my opinion, the Post is still operating like a print newspaper. That's not what it's owner intended. When Bezos bought it, he wanted it to become an internet business, like Amazon. That hasn't happened. They have hired a bunch of great journalists who write great stories that people don't read. The way the internet works is when users read stories, it triggers an ad, and that makes money. That's not happening.

I count myself as a regular Post reader. The main site only has 6 ads. That's a fraction of what most sites have. Fox News has 25 ads just on the home page. Plus sponsored stories that make money. The Post needs to drive more ad revenue, and that means writing stories that attract clicks. That's a different basis than what these writers usually use. They need to write better headlines that get readers to click on the stories. They need to build a message board system so readers can comment on stories (as we do here). In short, they have to change how they approach writing. That's why they fired the editor. She was a traditional editor. That's not what they need at the Post. Changing the Post to fit the internet platform will definitely affect the appearance of the product. It's up to the new editor that they don't whore the place out too much, while still improving revenue.
 
TheBigA said:
The Post needs to drive more ad revenue, and that means writing stories that attract clicks. That's a different basis than what these writers usually use. They need to write better headlines that get readers to click on the stories. They need to build a message board system so readers can comment on stories (as we do here). In short, they have to change how they approach writing. That's why they fired the editor. She was a traditional editor. That's not what they need at the Post. Changing the Post to fit the internet platform will definitely affect the appearance of the product. It's up to the new editor that they don't whore the place out too much, while still improving revenue.
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That is a commendable analysis that covers all the issues. The key is going from a bird cage liner to a true instantly responsive web journal.

The first thing they have to do is forget about "editions" unless they decide that there should be a "new" edition every hour so that they get multiple clicks a day. The "single morning edition" of the Post is an anachronism today.
 
DavidEduardo said:
The key is going from a bird cage liner to a true instantly responsive web journal.
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That's what Bezos wants. Bezos understands retail. Every square foot has to produce revenue. The fact that they only have 6 ads on their home page is terrible considering the amount of content they have on it. I hardly ever click on a story. I get everything I need by scanning the front page. If I'm a typical user (and they get statistics on this) then it's no wonder they're losing money. I would start by looking at user statistics, and redesign the front page.

The New York Times is even worse. Only two ads on their main page. The Wall Street Journal has over 20 ads on its front page. This is what the Post should aim for. They should view stories as inventory, and each story must make money. The Townsquare music sites pay their writers based on the money their stories make.
 
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TheBigA said:
That's what Bezos wants. Bezos understands retail. Every square foot has to produce revenue. The fact that they only have 6 ads on their home page is terrible considering the amount of content they have on it. I hardly ever click on a story. I get everything I need by scanning the front page. If I'm a typical user (and they get statistics on this) then it's no wonder they're losing money. I would start by looking at user statistics, and redesign the front page.
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The problem is that the newspaper folks have a "front page" and not a "home page" mentality.

Fox News has tidbits on the opening (not "front") page. As "open" indicates, they all link to expanded pages. Drudge does not even have stories, just headlines; you go off to one and return for more and more. Even ultra-conservative Breitbart has a tiny synopsis on the home page and that is the opposite of many newspapers who still present their online content as if it was a printed journal.

The post still can't figure out if it is a "paper" or a news source. Dead trees have been winning.

Your recommendation of redoing the front page and making it a home page is so simple but they still have not figured it out. Seriously, if you and I find this so obvious even from our somewhat different perspectives, why can't Bezos and his team do it?
TheBigA said:
The New York Times is even worse. Only two ads on their main page. The Wall Street Journal has over 20 ads on its front page. This is what the Post should aim for.
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WSJ has the same mentality as Fox. And that is all the "Murdoch feel" that goes back to sensational journalism decades ago. But they know how to attract people and how to be sticky enough to keep them and get them back often.

I look at the WSJ multiple times a day, and I can tell at a glance which new or updated stories I want toclick through on. Not so much the Post or the NYT, both of which I cancelled.
 
DavidEduardo said:
why can't Bezos and his team do it?
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That's why he hired a CEO, and why the CEO fired the editor, and then chewed out the staff. To quote: People are not reading your stuff. If you're a writer, that's like saying you suck. They thought Bezos bought them job security. Maybe for a little while, but not anymore.

My point is this has applications for radio. Everything radio does should make money. If it doesn't, someone isn't doing their job. Good content makes money if its merchandised properly. You don't want the sales goons to make those decisions, because they'll whore out the whole place. It's up to programming people to think like sales people, but with integrity and content knowledge.

The new editor came from WSJ. So you can expect to see changes that reflect that experience.
 
TheBigA said:
This is the one item on your list that caught my attention. In my opinion, the Post is still operating like a print newspaper. That's not what it's owner intended. When Bezos bought it, he wanted it to become an internet business, like Amazon.
Click to expand...
Neither you nor I know his exact motivations for the purchase. He does have a track record of being willing to lose money in order to gain market share. That approach doesn't translate to newspapers, though. I think it's reasonable to assume that he's not happy about losing that much money.

TheBigA said:
I count myself as a regular Post reader. The main site only has 6 ads. That's a fraction of what most sites have. Fox News has 25 ads just on the home page. Plus sponsored stories that make money. The Post needs to drive more ad revenue, and that means writing stories that attract clicks.
Click to expand...

I've subscribed to the online version for several years. I find that, on the mobile app where I do most of my reading, opinion pieces get in the way of reading actual news stories. Regardless, the challenge is monetizing the content in a way that doesn't tarnish the brand. The Post ain't Buzzfeed (which itself isn't doing so great at monetization) and no one should expect it to be. If they clutter up the site with ads, it's going to chase readers away. There are also issues with privacy (cookies/ad trackers) and security (ad networks which can be leveraged to deploy malware).

The Post's other problem is that it's trying to be a national newspaper and a regional newspaper at the same time. Regional newspapers have done poorly in the past 10-15 years while nationally-oriented newspapers haven't suffered as much. My own opinion is that regoinal newspapers spent too much time chasing awards and not enough time covering the daily grind of local events, thus becoming irrelevant to readers. So they lost subscriptions and advertising. The Post has shown some signs of that syndrome but, at other times, seems to be trying to carve out its own voice. Whether the new leadership is capable of resolving such conflicts remains to be seen. They're off to a bad start - in particular, coming across as if an old boy network linked to the new publisher has invaded the newspaper and will turn to the same playbook they've used elsewhere. This may or may not work at the Post.
 
Bezos bought the Post in 2013. According to this, in three years, the traffic on the site doubled, and it was profitable:


Under Bezos’ ownership the Post went from hemorrhaging advertising revenue to becoming a profitable business in 2016, and continuing to be profitable not just in 2017, but also in 2018, CNN has learned.
Click to expand...

So perhaps the Post is suffering from the same disease as radio, TV, and other media.
 
Mark Roberts said:
The Post's other problem is that it's trying to be a national newspaper and a regional newspaper at the same time. Regional newspapers have done poorly in the past 10-15 years while nationally-oriented newspapers haven't suffered as much. My own opinion is that regoinal newspapers spent too much time chasing awards and not enough time covering the daily grind of local events, thus becoming irrelevant to readers. So they lost subscriptions and advertising. The Post has shown some signs of that syndrome but, at other times, seems to be trying to carve out its own voice. Whether the new leadership is capable of resolving such conflicts remains to be seen. They're off to a bad start - in particular, coming across as if an old boy network linked to the new publisher has invaded the newspaper and will turn to the same playbook they've used elsewhere. This may or may not work at the Post.
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That sounds like every large city newspaper outlet like LA Times, New York Times, Chicago Tribune, San Jose Mercury, San Francisco Chronicle and Sacramento Bee in the past 10 to 15 years that has to please both national and regional news at the same time.

Suburban news outlets on the other hand have covered the daily grind of their specific town they are covering but get overshadowed by the events of core cities.
 
I have been an online subscriber to the Post for years. I enjoy the national news coverage and like to read the reader comments on stories. Some of the comments are "wicked smart" or riotously funny. I also look at CNN, but less and less as the forced ads have become extremely annoying.

There is a balance (from the reader's standpoint) between content and advertising. Think how many radio stations you have tuned out of because they have too many spots.

I have noticed the Post now has live video content and look forward to seeing that expanded.
 
Kemosabe said:
According to The New York Times, a clash between Sally Buzbee and Will Lewis over the publication of an article about British phone hacking preceded Ms. Buzbee's resignation.
www.nytimes.com

Clash Over Phone Hacking Article Preceded Exit of Washington Post Editor

Will Lewis, the chief executive of The Washington Post, objected to coverage of a legal development involving him in a phone hacking case.
www.nytimes.com www.nytimes.com
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That's a surefire way of turning your newsroom against you. Between that and the appearance of cronyism, Mr. Lewis is off to a bad start.
 
Kemosabe said:
According to The New York Times, a clash between Sally Buzbee and Will Lewis over the publication of an article about British phone hacking preceded Ms. Buzbee's resignation.
www.nytimes.com

Clash Over Phone Hacking Article Preceded Exit of Washington Post Editor

Will Lewis, the chief executive of The Washington Post, objected to coverage of a legal development involving him in a phone hacking case.
www.nytimes.com www.nytimes.com
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That sounds like one of the reporters who would not listen to the reorganization plans and needs and chose to defend the "old way" and, instead, asked about equal representation on the news staff when the paper was (and is) in crisis.
 
Washington Post is very "establishment" left (anti-progressive, but also anti-Trump.) It fills kind of a narrow niche of either centrist pro-Israel Democrats or "RINOs." I kind of think of them like Bill Maher, but haven't read them in a while, but that was kind of my impression. I remember they published multiple hit pieces on Bernie in 2016 in a 24 hour span right before the Democratic primaries.
 
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Now another attempt to squash reporting on Will Lewis' role in a phone hacking scandal has come out, this time an attempt to stop NPR from reporting on it. This is not going to end well.

www.nytimes.com

Washington Post C.E.O. Promised Interview for Ignoring Scandal, NPR Reporter Says

David Folkenflik of NPR wrote that the offer, in exchange for agreeing to stop his coverage of a phone hacking scandal, was made “repeatedly — and heatedly.”
www.nytimes.com www.nytimes.com

Get out the toaster.

Edit: here's NPR's version, which has additional context: https://www.npr.org/2024/06/06/nx-s1-4995105/washington-post-will-lewis-tries-to-kill-story-buzbee
 
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