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2/2/2. Why is that so satisfying?A rumor is going 'round that Oahu Publications, the Star-Bulletin's "parent" company, isn't going to let the contract to produce the weekly "Navy News" go without a fight. We could see court action challenging the Gannett bid because of potential conflicts on the part of Ken Berry, the former MidWeek exec who jumped to Gannett's Honolulu Advertiser just as the bids were being prepared. Even more interesting is the possibility that Oahu Publications will put a rival Navy newspaper on the streets, seeking to lock in existing advertising contracts by offering comparable circulation to the "official" publication. Either way, it seems they're going to fight over every bit of turf.
But yesterday I also received this query:
Why is the Star-Bulletin only putting two or three papers in each rack? I live downtown and go out and get the paper some mornings to see our morning edition. I came out the other day as the van was pulling away and there were only two papers in the rack. It has been like this over the last few months. When I first went down to get papers in April the racks would be full. I don't get it. We are talking a major street. Maybe you have an idea.
We may have solved the mystery of where Ms. Lizzie disappears to, but now we've got to deal with the disappearances themselves. I haven't seen her for more than 24 hours, although I'm not as worried as I would have been before learning of her secret realm down the hill, across the street, and under the stairs. It's Saturday, though, so I'll walk down and collect her after it gets light, and try to figure out why she's been such a chronic runaway all this week.
Late flash: Happy Birthday to them! According to an email just received from the newsroom, the Star-Bulletin turned 120 years old today.With all the furor over the new traffic camera vans and their high-tech speeding tickets, it's interesting to browse the corporate filings of the contractor, Affiliated Computer Services, which is a publicly traded company.
No further progress on sorting out the newspaper advertising revenues question. It may be that only time will tell. Or maybe someone out there will come up with some additional explanatory data. We'll see.
We've got several dramas going on in the cat household. Lindsey got himself in a fight several days ago. He came home wet and tired, and just wanted to sleep. I couldn't find the wounds when they were fresh, but the scratches on his neck and the bite on the side of his head were apparent by Wednesday. I dug some leftover antibiotics out of the refrigerator. Luckily, he's easy to pill, unlike most of our other cats who are most effective with the backup-twist-scratch routine designed to foil all but the most skilled pillers. Mr. Lindsey is sleeping next to me on top of the scanner now.
Mr. Lindsey
Meanwhile, I discovered where Ms. Lizzie has been disappearing to. I managed to track her going down our little hillside, meandering along through the plants at the bottom, out and across the road that runs straight up behind the Kaaawa fire station, and then she quickly ran up the driveway of house across the street and disappeared under the front stairs. The house is raised, and has a large storage area underneath which Lizzie has apparently turned into her own relatively private playground. Two days in a row I've come home, switched into garden shoes (the ones covered with mud), then followed the hidden path down the hillside, across the street, and found Ms. Lizzie happily under that house. She was happy to see me and cried loudly both times as she heard me coming, but I had to carry her back home with a firm grip on the back of her neck. Yesterday I talked to the woman who lives there, and introduced her to Ms. Lizzie, who as predicted was right under the front stairs.My guess is that Lizzie followed Lindsey over there at some point, since we've caught him on the other side of the street several times. Lizzie probably figured out that there aren't any other animals who live there, so it's virgin territory. It explains how she's able to disappear for long periods in heavy rain and not get wet. However, it's apparently partially disputed territory, sort of a boundary area where at least one black cat from down the street tests the defenses, and it may be where Lindsey got into his latest scuffle.
A landmark of sorts was reached in January, with over 9,100 visits recorded to this site during the month.
A story in the Philadelphia Inquirer attributes 60 degree winter temperatures and drought conditions in parts of the mainland to the unusual weather that's been hanging around here and which, they say, is called "the Pineapple Express." Funny to read a Philly paper to find out more about the nuts and bolts of our own weather here in Hawaii.Still more reactions came in yesterday on the relative strength debate that started out last weekend. I'll restate it this way: Can claims that the Star-Bulletin has garnered some 40% of the newspaper advertising market be reconciled with data released by Gannett last month showing an overall decline in their Honolulu advertising revenues of 11.5 percent?
The first reply is from Burl Burlingame at the Star-Bulletin, who offers up a theory which, if true, would come close to making sense of the numbers. You can read Burl's full analysis over at his Honolulu Newspaper War (a.k.a. Honolulu News Blues) site. Other reactions follow.
Apparently, the Gannett advertising revenue losses didn't include the monies HNA was making from the Star-Bulletin under the JOA agreement. That's the missing X factor. That was about 30 percent of their Honolulu revenue, and if you add to that the bit of Advertiser slippage, you get a market share of a bit over 30 percent. This makes more sense than dramatic increases in total advertising expenditures for Honolulu merchants.Midweek is now part of the Star-Bulletin package deal, too, and folks overlook that. MidWeek is improving mightily with Ken Berry gone. Whatever the numbers, we have a piece of the pie that Gannett wants all to itself. At this point, that piece is enough to keep us alive.
The Star-Bulletin is in a position of strength, not of weakness. It absorbed the worst Gannett could give, namely Gannett's defying the federal court by handing over an out-of-date and/or inaccurate subscription list, and in other ways.Now the time is running out on the exclusive contracts Gannett signed with advertising clients a year ago. And the advertising clients are moving toward the Star-Bulletin.
The David Black shareholders are outright owners of their business. They don't have public shareholders clamoring for more.
Gannett does.
just a quick note here - the last few days there have been a couple of people who have gotten on your site who have been able to voice their skepticism about our ad rates and profits and our eventual fall. that's certainly a legitimate view, but for the sake of fairness, somewhere in there you may want to allow someone to voice their own opinions about gannett's spin on their own profits - why should anyone take their word and not the star bulletin's? it seems their motive is clear - the "experts" forecasts of our doom are played up on high volume for what reason other than to to further demoralize our staff? if we fail, then we fail, but it hasn't happened yet so give us a frickin break and wait until it actually occurs.
the lack of inserts is a sore point with the S-B.perhaps you addressed this earlier but when the S-B sunday edition got off the ground in April, we've heard that section editors were told that Gannett had threatened to pull the entire chain out of its national contract with the company that prints the glossy coupons if the company agreed to a contract with the S-B.
that's for the coupons. i don't know if it includes inserts for companies such as CompUSA, office max and office depot.
anyway, it's interesting if it's true.
And so it goes.
Reactions to the exchange over the relative health of the Star-Bulletin continued over the past couple of days.Star-Bulletin writer Burl Burlingame spelled out this explanation:
That guy wrote me also about the Gannett advertising revenue claims, and I explained it to him, but he just doesn't get it. Gannett's advertising revenue is down, let's say, an even 10 percent. And we claim we're getting, let's say, 40 percent of the ad dollars being spent in Honolulu.To this guy, those numbers should match. But they don't, because market share and advertising revenue, while linked, are not the same thing. People have to spend MORE now to advertise in both papers. If they spent a dollar last year, and are now spending $1.40 to advertise, and of that, the Gannett paper is getting 90 cents, then Gannett's ad revenue is down 10 percent. But then ours has gone from zero cents to 50 cents in a year.
A bit later, Burl added: "I was painting in broad strokes. The point is that Gannett's loss is advertising revenue isn't EXACTLY matched by our increase. People have to spend more now to advertise in both papers."
But another source who wants the Star-Bulletin to survive but is familiar with the operations at both newspapers had this to say:
Their (Star-Bulletin) advertising lineage has not grown. They do not have the lineage or inserts to financially justify a Sunday product, especially after this many months. I too am getting first hand reports of incredibly cheap deals for advertisers from the S-B. No, budgets are not increasing, and their claims for 40% market share are believable only to themselves. Don't they think we "locals" can figure this stuff out?I couldn't suppress a groan when reading an account in Editor & Publisher by AP of the struggle to keep the Jersey Journal alive, with unions struggling over demands for a 50 percent staff cut as the price of continued publishing.
The box waiting for us in the one-room Kaaawa Post Office, looked like the poster child of the "suspicious mail" campaign, complete with lots of tape, irregular packaging, and hand-scrawled address. I was expecting it to set off some kind of postal response, but it somehow made it through their system, and was burped onto the counter right under the "suspicious mail alert" poster. But it turned out to be just a belated birthday present for Meda from her brother in Portland. Thanks, Mr. Bob.
Lizzie has returned to her wandering ways over the last week, disappearing for long stretches of time. She had been scared out of this pattern after a couple of encounters with two errant dogs from down the street. The experience kept her very close to home for almost two months, but after several cautious forays into the yard, she's been off, we know not where. I've got her confined to quarters this morning, and she's pacing around to let me know that "out" is her definite preference, at least for now.
And from former Hawaii broadcaster Jack Kellner, who retired in 1999, this observation on the Safeway near his new home:
It's got to be Hawaii because here in our small town, Sonoma, we have a huge Safeway that carries probably the best selection of grocery items I've seen. We do most of our shopping at a local store that features an old fashioned meat department where nothing is pre-wrapped and the meat is all choice with a selection of dry aged and organically raised beef. The chickens are all fresh and local grown. But Safeway is the place for the staples and they are at the top of the list for a wide variety of items along with their own house brands.
Unless the rain stops soon, it looks like we'll have to skip the morning walk. It's been raining all night here in Kaaawa. It hasn't been the harsh, pounding, strain the roof kind of sustained tropical cloudburst that the area is capable of, but it has been steady for more than ten hours now. At least our roof doesn't leak, which is more than you can say about the main state court building across from Restaurant Row, where a half-dozen containers lined with plastic bags were set out yesterday just inside the main entrance to catch leaks.Somehow, despite the rain, we've still got several cats outside. Lindsey and Harry just came in as I crawled out of bed. They weren't too wet, although how that was managed is a mystery to me given the overall degree of wet. They both accepted fresh towels laid out on chairs in the living room where they're now lounging, and Leo's claimed the towel where Lindsey spent the day yesterday.
My Saturday comments on alternatives to Safeway stores brought the following wonderful reply from a Kalihi reader:
Thanks for the rant about Safeway. I am forced to be there once a week when I take my mum on errands, because it is her neighborhood store (Aikahi) and she's familiar with it. I usually wait outside, or I just get angry.The pattern I have noticed over the years: they carry a new, exciting specialty item (di Giorno's fresh pasta and sauces, for instance) for awhile, then make their own and present it side-by-side (theirs being cheaper), then they drop the original and only offer their own -- which is in nearly identical packaging to the original.
They've done it with deli meats and cheeses, sausages, soda pop, drug items, paper goods -- anything you can name. The only selection is "SELECT."
The worse one was in the meat department. I used to amuse myself, while waiting for a mum who wants no help or company while shopping, by hassling the meat department about not carrying local chicken. Every happy employee who asked if they could help me got the request, "Yes, thank you, where is your local chicken?" Most would actually look for it, which made me wonder just how much training they get, since that Safeway never carried it and never will.
But the capper -- the day I decided never to shop there again -- came the day I saw the Foster Farms chicken cozying up in the case to a new offering: Safeway chicken!! And guess which was more plentiful and cheaper? It just makes me cringe.
I was in the leadership of the Safeway, Gallo wine and table grape boycott for the UFW here in -- late 60's? No love lost between us. (Years later, in San Francisco, Cesar Chavez told me the Hawai'i effort took the boycott to critical mass and got them their contract.)
Oh, and the friendly "May I help you?". I'm old enough to remember when that meant "Are you trying to shoplift that item?", so I really hate that. And they offer to help you to the car, when all you have is one little bottle of water. It's insulting.
On the way to the restroom, in the bowels of the backstage, past vegetables awaiting a trim and warehoused goods, there is an employee information board. On it is a peppy poster, handwritten: How many customer greets did you do today? Did you initiate the greet?
That pretty much sez it all.
So it does.
It didn't take long. Less than a month after the announcement that Gannett had entered into a joint venture with Donrey to develop the Hawaii.com web site, former links to the Star-Bulletin have disappeared. From the news page, you can get Advertiser headlines, of course. You can also link to the Honolulu Weekly, Ka Leo (the UH Manoa student newspaper), even the Molokai Dispatch. But not the Star-Bulletin.The Advertiser announced yesterday that it has taken another bit of business away from David Black's Star-Bulletin/MidWeek. This time it's the contract to print and distribute the weekly Navy News, which had previously been done by MidWeek. The Navy News, and other military base newspapers, have featured prominently in Star-Bulletin/MidWeek advertising showing the potential extended reach of the combined publications. No details of the contract or Gannett's bid were disclosed.
This item comes courtesy of the sharp eyes of former S-B webmaster Blaine Fergerstrom:
For sale on eBay, one copy June 12 1961 Star-Bulletin with short clip of one of the articles. Byline: Helen Altonn!Just think, folks: In 1961, Helen had already been at the paper for 6 years! A "veteran"!
Just a reminder of the awesome force that is Helen Altonn. Still here after all these years.You go, Helen!
Yesterday started out gray and threatening, and luckily it stayed that way most of the day, so the cats had the option of being outside. It turned to rain later in the afternoon, and at least for a while it was quite serious rain. It's from the south, so blows up on our front stairs and into the garage. The plants love the rain. The cats don't.
All the cats checked in except for Lizzie, who did not show up until it was time for dinner. But she was dry, which is more than can be said for the others.
I ran across a 1999 Maryland court decision involving Gannett's method of reporting income for tax purposes. It includes an interesting description of the way money is handled between the various subsidiaries before fading off into tax law complexities.
Several emails yesterday morning alerted me to a Star-Bulletin news brief announcing the resignation of Richard Halloran, who has served as editorial director during this first year since the dissolution of the JOA. No word on who will step up to take his place, and no heir apparent standing by. Hard to believe that we're just weeks away from the one-year mark.Another email brought this query, for which I've got no answer. The writer guesses that the drop in revenue experienced by the Advertiser represents advertising sales taken away by the Star-Bulletin. But, he says, the reported decline simply isn't enough to sustain the new S-B.
Newspapers took a big hit Sept. 11, and we were hoping to see the Bulletin get half the newspaper budgets. So if Gannett is only down 15%, and part of that is the result of 9-11, what is the Bulletin getting? I saw another article in PBN that said the Bulletin was getting 40% of the market share. If these are official numbers, they sure don't match up with the numbers shown by Gannett's reports.If advertisers are spending 90% of what they spent last year with the Advertiser, they are not spending 35-45% with the Bulletin. In down economic times no business person can up their advertising budget 30%.
If you look at market trends, it is dictated by available advertising dollars. That number is not going to go up 30% in bad economic times (or business would be closing up like crazy). I have friends that tell me they spend the bulk of their money with the Advertiser, and then get cheap deals from the Bulletin. They must be giving great deals to give the perception of competing. But you're not really competing if your only taking 10% from your competitor. I want the Bulletin to do well, but putting on rose color glasses isn't going to help. No matter how good the product is, if you can't charge a workable rate, you're in trouble.
Getting 40% of the market in ads , but 10-15% of revenue isn't good. Expenses will eat you alive.
As I say, I've got no answer to this line of reasoning. Anybody else out there able to contribute a thought or two? Anonymity is fine.
And from Burl Burlingame: "Alas, indications are (from my server reps) that the NewspaperWar site got hacked sometime Friday. Gonna be down for a while...."
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