The Washington Put up’s evisceration by the hands of its billionaire proprietor, Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, didn’t need to occur.
However regardless that the ones strikes inflicted substantial injury, the paper were floundering ever since Donald Trump’s first presidential time period, when Bezos proudly added the slogan “Democracy Dies in Darkness” to its nameplate and the paper accomplished each enlargement and profitability.
Whilst its important rival, The New York Instances, effectively pivoted via rolling out ancillary merchandise similar to video games, a cooking app and a shopper information, the Put up misplaced momentum – and was once then driven off a cliff as Bezos, personally, began putting a better worth on peace with Trump than on ensuring that democracy didn’t die in darkness.
5 excellent examples
In all probability an important distinction between those papers and the Put up – and the loads of different shrinking media retailers owned via company chains and hedge finances – is that they’re rooted within the communities they duvet. Whether or not owned via rich other folks or run via nonprofits, they position carrier to their town and area above extracting the ultimate smidgen of income they may be able to squeeze out.
Those papers have an array of possession fashions.
The Boston Globe and The Minnesota Big name Tribune, each for-profits, had been purchased lately via the billionaire homeowners of sports activities groups.
The Seattle Instances, every other for-profit, has belonged to the similar family members since 1896.
The Philadelphia Inquirer was once received via a billionaire and donated to a nonprofit basis in 2016, making it a number one instance of a hybrid for-profit and nonprofit fashion.
The Salt Lake Tribune, which a billionaire purchased from the hedge fund Alden World Capital, was once transformed to a natural nonprofit – the primary such paper to go through any such transition.
The entrance web page of The Washington Put up on Aug. 6, 2013, introduced that Jeff Bezos had agreed to shop for the newspaper from the Graham family members.
Saul Loeb/AFP by the use of Getty Photographs
Commonplace subject matters
It’s exhausting to spot particular the reason why those papers have succeeded, however a couple of subject matters emerge.
The Boston Globe and The Minnesota Big name Tribune, for example, have each expanded into different geographic spaces. The Globe has moved into Rhode Island and New Hampshire – with extra to come back in 2026.
The Globe has additionally balanced experimentation with consideration to the fundamentals.
No longer lengthy after John and Linda Henry purchased the Globe in 2013, they began a separate electronic newsletter referred to as Crux, which coated the Catholic Church. It failed to draw advertisers, and the Globe spun it off; Crux continues beneath other possession.
In the meantime, every other Globe-owned startup, Stat, which covers well being and drugs, grew right into a a hit undertaking right through the COVID-19 pandemic.
As for the fundamentals, the Globe fees a top class for its journalism – up to $36 a month for a digital-only subscription. And regardless that paid electronic circulate has stalled over the last yr at about 260,000, that’s significantly greater than maximum papers in its weight magnificence.
Through the best way, the theory of putting in place a separate nonprofit arm was once pioneered via The Seattle Instances, even if it has change into an increasing number of commonplace.
The Seattle Instances not too long ago passed off control of the paper to Ryan Blethen, who represents the 5th technology of his family members to function writer. By contrast to previously family-owned papers such because the Courier Magazine of Louisville, Kentucky, and The Des Moines Sign up, whose huge households pressured their sale two generations in the past, The Seattle Instances has if truth be told change into extra impartial: In 2024, the Instances purchased out Chatham Asset Control, a personal fairness company that had managed 49.5% of the paper.
Nonprofit possession
Along with the for-profit fashion, two different possession buildings have proven promise.
In 2016, H.F. “Gerry” Lenfest donated The Philadelphia Inquirer, which he and a spouse had purchased simply two years previous, to a nonprofit that was once renamed the Lenfest Institute following his dying in 2018.
The paper has thrived beneath the brand new association, with the writer, Elizabeth Hughes, writing not too long ago that the fashion might be used to restore the Pittsburgh Put up-Gazette, at the reverse finish of Pennsylvania.
The Put up-Gazette’s homeowners, bringing up mounting losses, have introduced that the paper will close down in Might.
And regardless that The Salt Lake Tribune is the primary – and, nonetheless, the one – metro day by day to embody a natural nonprofit fashion, it stands as an intriguing thought that may be emulated in different places.
A poster boy for decline
There aren’t any simple fixes. However perseverance, innovation and a constant center of attention on serving the general public are the keys to good fortune, irrespective of possession construction or geography. Bezos may be told from those fashions.
