Dean Singleton and Jody Lodovic, CEO and president, respectively, of the Denver-based MediaNews Group, sent out an end-of-year memo to staffers.
Here’s the entire memo, via MinnPost.com and Poynter (delusional part bolded for emphasis):
TO: MNG/MNGi Employees
FROM: Dean Singleton and Jody Lodovic
SUBJECT: 2009 is almost gone. Thanks for getting us through it!
First and foremost, let us thank you for your hard work and dedication during this difficult economic period, a time particularly hard for the newspaper industry. You have been asked to do more with less, and we truly appreciate your efforts and sacrifices.
While the past three years have been particularly challenging (especially 2009) for MediaNews Group and the newspaper industry, we are proud of your performance and many accomplishments, and we are confident that our strategies will lead us and the industry into a bright future. Let us highlight just a few of your/our accomplishments during this challenging period:
* Advertising - While advertising revenue has been severely challenged, your performance has been near the top of the industry throughout 2009. For the three-month period ended September, for example, your advertising revenue declined 24% as compared to the industry decline of 28.2%. This performance was consistent with the first two quarters. Furthermore, in markets such as St. Paul, the Bay Area, and Los Angeles, we significantly outperformed other newspapers in the regions.
We have made significant progress in transforming our sales organization and have invested in new tools, such as iShare, training and laptops, to position us to meet the ever changing needs of our advertisers. Your success has been noted and is appreciated.
* Circulation - Your circulation performance is second to none. In the September ABC 6-month report, MediaNews Group had circulation growth even as the industry lost 10.6%. That increase included The Denver Post growth which came after the demise of its primary competitor, The Rocky Mountain News. However, not including Denver, the company's loss was 4.8%, still the best performance in the industry by far. This performance moved the company from number 4 to number 2, as measured by circulation.
* News - Our circulation performance would be impossible if not for the excellent news products each of your newspapers produce. There is not enough space here to comment on all the awards your newsrooms have won this year. While we, like others, have had no choice but to trim news staffs, we have tried to consolidate infrastructure to preserve reporting staff when possible. And with hard work and creativity, your newsrooms have re-invented themselves and continue to do excellent journalism. We are so proud of our outstanding editors and their dedicated staffs. And speaking of creativity, we are awed by the outstanding work you are doing online. As our traffic continues to soar, our audiences between print and online have never been larger.
* Operations - The year has brought major plant consolidation for many of our newspapers. Added to creative circulation and route consolidation and new ways of doing production, you have achieved efficiencies we never would have dreamed possible while improving the service you provide.
