Worcester Business Journal

wbjournal.com | May 29, 2017 | Worcester Business Journal 11 Local news still has an audience For years, the news industry has been going through a period of transition thanks largely to the internet. Average weekly circulation for U.S. newspapers fell 7 percent in 2015, the biggest drop since 2010, according to the Pew Research Center. When polled, WBJ read- ers overwhelming said newspapers like the Telegram & Gazette will survive in one form or another. F L A S H P O L L What do you think lies ahead for smaller local newspapers? 19% They'll make way for small online-only local news startups. 12% 23% They'll survive the way they are as long as there's an audience that's hungry for local news. 46% The Telegram & Gazette, a timeline under GateHouse has brought both cost savings and job losses. GateHouse's nine daily newspapers and 108 weeklies in Massachusetts are printed at only two production facilities. Local jobs once responsible for editing and laying out newspaper stories for the next day's edition are now done for most Massachusetts GateHouse papers at an Austin, Texas, office, creating common national, international, business or sports pages that the papers share. T&G Publisher Paul Provost said the past two-plus years under GateHouse have brought stability to the paper. "For the most part, we have really hit our stride in the most recent past," said Provost, who arrived in November 2015. Looking ahead, he said, "I wish I had a crystal ball. We have a very strong product line, and I think there's a lot of years le in this daily newspa- per in particular." Constrained circumstances Dan Kennedy, a journalism professor at Northeastern University and an author of a book on the modern jour- nalism age, thinks the T&G is not better off under GateHouse. The New York Times and Henry would have likely cut jobs in recent years, too, he said, but not likely as much as GateHouse, which is known for its cost-cutting. "It's hard to think of anyone that's leaner," said Kennedy, who is working as an unpaid advisor to the Worcester Sun, an online news outlet. Cutting local production jobs and moving that work to Austin may have saved the T&G from having to cut local reporters, Kennedy said, but still shrunk the Worcester newsroom nonetheless. James Dempsey, an arts and human- ities instructor at Worcester Polytechnic Institute, left the T&G as a columnist in 2001. Dempsey said he first foresaw strug- gles for the print industry in 1986, when the Challenger shuttle exploded. With TV news covering the event, he said, he felt his column for the next day's paper was already obsolete. "There was that, and of course the internet, and the great days of the pro- vincial city paper were just about over," he said. They'll eventually transition into an online-only model but will need the right team in place to get there. They'll become part of larger news corporations and increasingly feature content from their bigger sister papers. COMMENTS: "You'll find smaller newspapers will begin to run feature stories rather than news stories because they will have fewer reporters to cover breaking news or news in general." "As long as they are not daily news-generated they will be fine. Weekly newspapers are actually growing since they are not daily news- generated. Concentrate on the news: schools, sports. etc. on a community level." "Those that adapt to change and incorporate free print and online access will survive." P H O T O / N A T H A N F I S K E W Jan. 1, 1866: The first issue of the Worcester Evening Gazette is published. May 19, 1886: The first issue of Worcester Daily Telegram is published. 1920: The two papers come under the common ownership of Theodore Ellis, a former Telegram pressman. 1986: Local ownership ends when the family of Robert Stoddard sells the paper to the Chronicle Publishing Co. of San Francisco. 1989: The Worcester Telegram and the Evening Gazette merge. April 15, 1996: The newspaper's website debuts. Jan. 2000: The Chronicle Publishing Co. sells the T&G to The New York Times Co. for $296 million. 2012: The newspaper moves from its longtime home at 20 Franklin St. to 100 Front St. Oct. 2013: John Henry, the Boston Red Sox owner, buys the T&G and The Boston Globe from The New York Times Co. for $70 million March 2014: Harry Whitin, a retired T&G editor, and Ralph Crowley Jr., Polar Beverages CEO, withdraw their bid to buy the paper. June 2014: Henry sells the T&G for $17.4 million to Halifax Media Group, the parent company of a string of newspapers mainly between North Carolina and Florida. Jan. 2015: New Media Investment Group, the parent company of GateHouse Media, pays $280 million to buy Halifax Media Group, including the T&G. 2013: Gatehouse files for bankruptcy and emerges as New Media Investment Group. Feb. 2017: A firm that manages and advises New Media, Fortress Investment Group, becomes a subsidiary of a Japanese investment firm, SoftBank.

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