The Fall Of Knight-Ridder: Publishing Tragedy Or Darth Vader Victim?
And so the latest bit of hard news in the sad, sad tale of the demise of the once-great Knight-Ridder newspaper chain hit the wires today:
PHILADELPHIA May 23, 2006 (AP)— McClatchy Co. is selling The Philadelphia Inquirer and the Philadelphia Daily News for $562 million to a group of local investors who hope to reverse circulation declines by emphasizing local news and doing more with the Internet.The two Philadelphia papers are being bought by a group led by advertising executive Brian Tierney and Bruce Toll, co-founder of luxury home builder Toll Brothers Inc. The papers are currently owned by Knight Ridder Inc. and are among 12 that McClatchy doesn’t plan to keep once it completes its purchase of the rest of the company.
McClatchy and the investor group said in a statement that they intend to complete the deal around the same time that McClatchy closes its deal for Knight Ridder, which is expected this summer. McClatchy will receive $515 million in cash, and the investment group, Philadelphia Media Holdings, will assume $47 million in pension liabilities.
A sad tale? Or is it a case of shooting yourself in the foot and bleeding to death?
On his blog ‘Kiko’s House,’ Shaun Mullen, a prize-winning former Knight-Ridder reporter/editor has a MUST READ POST that needs to be read in FULL. Here’s a tiny part of what he says, a needed reminder that many stories on Knight-Ridder have seemingly clouded part of the issue:
Back in the day, Knight Ridder was the class of U.S. newspaper chains because of its commitment to excellence. That hasn’t necessarily changed. But at some point the balance between having well-resourced newsrooms and keeping Knight Ridder’s stock price up tipped in the direction of Wall Street, and Ridder was the tipper in chief.Ridder said two things during my two decades-plus in Philadelphia that best exemplify why he became the Darth Vader of an industry that trashed newspapers although they were in decent financial health, remained viable investments and vital players in their communities.
Read his post to find out what they are — and learn a lot more as well.
In reading his post, yours truly, a former employee of Knight-Ridder Newspapers (The Wichita Eagle-Beacon 1980-1982), has to say two things:
(1) He’s right.
(2) I almost forgot.
HE’S RIGHT: When I sought a staff newspaper job after writing on a free-lance basis for five years for newspapers such as The Chicago Daily News and The Christian Science Monitor from New Delhi, Madrid, and other foreign news spots, Knight-Ridder was the up-and-coming JEWEL of newspaper chains. (Several journalists in the late 70s would say that KRN editors had a high divorce rate because they were so “married” to their newspapers).
The San Jose Mercury News and the Miami Herald and other KRN big city dailies were aspiring Washington Posts. The conventional wisdom among young journalists was that KRN was a great place to be, a career destination, because its individual papers and the chain had as the top priority editorial excellence. From its superb foreign news coverage to its Washington coverage to its comprehensive, content-heavy local news — all produced with the help of hugely dedicated and tough editors — Knight-Ridder put out one of the best newspaper products anywhere.
The quality was consistent: you could visit a small city and see a Knight-Ridder paper and it had the same quality (mainly because it was usually staffed by many reporters and editors seeking to move on to the bigger KRN papers and their standards were exacting).
I ALMOST FORGOT how I noticed a definite change. This change seemed dramatic in recent years, at least in terms of the consistency of KRN newspapers’ overall look. Some years ago, after not seeing the San Jose and Miami newspapers for many years, I picked them up and was shocked by the change in the papers’ overall content and “feel.” They were still good papers but it was as if someone had decided to reduce quality content and not necessarily because the “news hole” had been reduced, as pages became fewer and advertising was not necessarily as plentiful.
The papers seemed less compelling, less satisfying, less sparkling, less aspiring to be regional (or national) voices. Now they were just good local papers. In the 70s, 80s and even the early 90s they seemed to be so much more. It was NOT as if you felt you were reading papers less committed to excellence; it seemed as if the papers had somehow been punched in the stomach.
Something had been cut out of Knight-Ridder, even though its papers and news bureaus still have some of the finest reporters and editors in the world (Knight-Ridder‘s Washington Bureau produces some of the best reporting and analysis around today).
Muller’s post pinpoints what it was.
Perhaps, in the end, what Ridder really cut out had to do with some things called journalistic passion…and “heart.”
SOME OTHER VIEWS ON THE DEMISE OF KRN. These are excerpts so read the entire posts:
The “heart� that Joe mourns the loss of is missing from a lot of American businesses these days: not just newspapers but the automobile industry, airlines, entertainment companies, many others, representing practically every segment of the economy. After the 2000 contraction even the tech sector seems to have lost its sparkle. Does Microsoft still have the missionary fervor they had 20 years ago?The obvious answer is greed but I think the problem goes a little farther than that. I blame professional management—not just MBA’s but the concept itself.
–Classical Values examines some of the local Philadelphia and blog reaction to the sale and in a detailed analysis writes:
Big national chains are bad, and local ownership is good, right? Not necessarily. It depends on who the local parties are — and whom you ask…Bad and “scary” times ahead? The Inquirer has been struggling, and now it appears that it will survive. What is scary about that?…..I’m glad the Inquirer will survive, and I think it’s a good thing for for it to become an independent local newspaper again. I see no reason to expect to see any change in their editorial viewpoints, and I am sure I’ll continue to have regular disagreements. Nothing scary about it.
5 Responses to “The Fall Of Knight-Ridder: Publishing Tragedy Or Darth Vader Victim?”
I had the pleasure of being a Miami Herald subscriber during the mid-80s, and it really was a great newspaper then. Like you say, it had the feel of a paper that absolutely aspired to be the best.
The few times more recently that I’ve had the opportunity to pick one up were disappointing. It’s still a good paper, but it doesn’t sparkle anymore. It was immediately noticible to me as a former reader.
Still, I will say that I think USAToday has gotten much better over the same period of time – which is odd given that USAT was usually pointed to as one of the original boogeymen thought to be destroying newspapers as we know (knew?) them.
MIKE (this is still written from Arizona where I am still “stranded” but hope my car part comes in so I can be on my way today): You make and EXCELLENT POINT. When I was job hunting I was told KRN was the best chain and that Gannett was middling. Gannett had the reputation of keeping tight lid on their local papers and really not putting the money in the editorial content that Knight Ridder was willing to do. When USA Today was launched a lot of experts laughed, calling it “McPaper,” shallow, incredibly gaudy. What happened? Other papers (including the LA Times and the NY Times) started using more color, too. USA Today was ahead of its time because it offered punchy shorter stories, but well-written and edited ones. Their longer, in depth pieces in their sections are as good as written anywhere. I do believe it is now one of the best papers in the United States. I and other people who do weblogs make the mistake of only linking to and quoting most of the usual papers. I’ve tried to consciously explore others and keep tabs on my former news outlet for my stories overseas, The Christian Science Monitor. But I and others need to read USA Today more regularly and link to some of their work because the paper does superb work. Yes, like others they’ve had their share of journalistic scandals. But there has been a commitment since the paper started to offer readers a kind of content and they’ve stuck to it all these years. Thanks for our comments on the Herald. It’s exactly what I saw. PS: Gannett’s local papers have also largely stood the test of time: it has been a corporation that appears to have “grown” in more ways than one.
I wonder if the crop of journalists that graduated in the mid 90′s are to blame. It seems their willingness to join the “new media” movment we now have, and abandon the investigative jornalism which made true journalistic stars in the old days has given way to the desire to please the editors with fluff thats easy to edit, and not ruffle feathers has taken hold pretty firmly.
Atleast we all still have the Toledo Blade as an example of an old style newspaper.
Pyst – Are you a Toledoan?
No, I was using the Blade as an example since they are amongst the last bastions of old style independant investigative journalism left.
PING:
TITLE: Who’s afraid of the big bad Republicans?
BLOG NAME: Classical Values
Big national chains are bad, and local ownership is good, right? Not necessarily. It depends on who the local parties are — and whom you ask. Huge headlines today confirm that the Philadelphia Inquirer has been bought by a consortium…
PING:
TITLE: You’ve gotta know the territory
BLOG NAME: The Glittering Eye
Joe Gandelman has an excellent post on the decline of the once-great Knight-Ridder newspaper chain. As a former newspaperman himself, he concludes with a lament:
When I sought a staff newspaper job after writing on a freelance basis for five years fo…