NORFOLK
The Virginian-Pilot won't be sold. At least for now.
The owner of The Pilot, Landmark Media Enterprises LLC, announced Tuesday that it had taken the newspaper and its affiliates off the market, citing the credit crunch.
Landmark, however, intends to resume the sale process for The Virginian-Pilot Media Cos. when the economy improves, said Richard F. Barry III, the company's vice chairman. The company, he said, will remain open to offers in the meantime.
Landmark officials said in January that they were looking to sell all of their properties, without offering a reason. In September, Landmark completed the sale of its best-known business, The Weather Channel Cos., to NBC Universal and two private-equity firms.
But the next month, Landmark said it had taken nearly all of its other properties, including Dominion Enterprises, a marketing services company based in Norfolk, off the market.
Most of the prospective buyers, stymied by the credit crunch, could not get financing, Barry said. But Landmark continued negotiations for The Pilot with a buyer who Barry said was "encouraged about obtaining financing."
On Tuesday, though, Landmark announced that it was suspending the sale process for the newspaper.
"The party was very enthusiastic about buying The Virginian-Pilot Media Cos. and was putting together a financial package but could not complete it because of the credit squeeze," Barry said.
The decision, he said, was mutual. Barry declined to name the company with which Landmark was negotiating.
The Virginian-Pilot's affiliates include military-base newspapers; publications such as Port Folio Weekly and Inside Business; a direct mail company; and Web sites including PilotOnline.com, HamptonRoads.com and HamptonRoads.tv.
Barry said last month that Landmark was talking to potential buyers for two other properties, both outside Norfolk. But now all of the company's businesses are off the market, he said Tuesday.
Landmark still intends to sell "all of its assets," Barry said. It will remain open to offers and will place its businesses back on the market once the economy perks up.
Barry said he couldn't predict when that would happen. A news release from Landmark last month said the company "will operate its businesses for several years before reinstituting the sales process."
Philip Walzer, (757) 222-3864, phil.walzer@pilotonline.com
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It's hard to compete with the internet.
The Pilot provides yesterday's news tomorrow.
Well said
Well said CFredrick
As for a purported bias, losers always blame the media. Conservatives always blame Hollywood. Liberals always blame small-mindedness. The Pilot has an enviable history of progressive stances. It's a shame we're losing so many writers and editors who know the local scene and its history, who know the people behind the stories, and know which stories need telling. You sure won't get that from any of the local TV broadcasters, who seem content to do little more than read the police blotter.
I'm sure it has a lot to do with the fact the Banks took our Bailout money and are giving themselves raises, buying other banks as opposed to making it available to help the credit crunch....When will government learn not to play bank with a banker....This industry needs serious regulation to protect citizens from these greedy treacherous men..
The bias will continue.
The bias will continue.
It's all about the money
Some year, people will learn that it's not about being left or right wing, but about making money. Money drives the media more than anything else. It IS a business after all. Do those who watch Fox News actually think Rupert Murdoch created it just to give right wingers a news channel? He did it to MAKE MONEY, plain and simple.
As for the Virginia Pilot being sold, with newspapers being a dying media, it doesn't surprise me they haven't had much luck selling it. It reminds me of the old joke of the guy in the alley way offering some 'great' deal to any passersby gullible enough to stop and listen to him.
Crossword and Bird Cages
The only reason I take the VP.
The challenges facing the Pilot
The challenges facing the Pilot are no different from those facing papers of all papers, and papers whose editorial pages espouse all political points of view. By virtue of your presence here, most of the people posting here are showing their support for the concept of a newspaper. But there are fewer of us these days. It's not much more complex than that.
As for a purported bias, losers always blame the media. Conservatives always blame Hollywood. Liberals always blame small-mindedness. The Pilot has an enviable history of progressive stances. It's a shame we're losing so many writers and editors who know the local scene and its history, who know the people behind the stories, and know which stories need telling. You sure won't get that from any of the local TV broadcasters, who seem content to do little more than read the police blotter.
They need Subscribers subscribers subscribers
There is always someone making money regardless of the state of the economy. The Warren Buffets of the world are today buying stocks at bargain prices, poised to profit when the market stabilizes and stock values climb again.
The sale of the Pilot seems more a "how much is it worth" issue than a bad economy thing. The VP's value is based on how many readers it has, which determines advertising rates. Landmark wants to sell for $XXX dollars, and a buyer wants to pay $xx dollars based on the VP's earning potential.
The SS VA Pilot left a wide wake this election cycle, alienating a good percentage of Hampton Roads with percieved biased coverage and news stories belonging in "Opinions", not on the front page. With the election over, the Pilot will focus on repairing the damage they caused, try to get the number of readers/subscribers to marketable levels, and sell the paper for more $$$.
The Daily Planet they ain't.
Newspaper
Do you really think a newspaper is a good investment and more so with the economy tanking?
Huh??
Can the Pilot be a beacon of light in this area?
Submitted by Liz Day on Wed, 12/03/2008 at 10:32 am.
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Just what the heck does that MEAN? A beacon of light?
Newspapers are supposed to report the news. Alternatively, they have an editorial staff that makes opinion on issues. Their opinions are based on what they think is right, and when the issue is political, their political philosophies will color their opinion.
Ms. Day, I'm not targeting you, but the term "Beacon of Light" brings to mind bringing home wayfaring sailors ... showing them the way. I do not give that much power to newspapers. They are a bunch of people like you and me, with differing opinions, no worse or better than mine. I may agree or disagree with them, but they do not make my opinion for me. I think that ascribing such an all-knowing aura on any media is dangerous.
here's an idea..
Sell it to the city of virginia beach! You've been in the tank for them and their developer pals for years. Now make em pay up for all the years of being their flunky.
MaryM - I didn't know he was
MaryM - I didn't know he was tight with Regent, that is scary given that Regent is (as far as I know) a horribly ranked law school, that has an agenda of taking away freedoms from the American people, and happens to have a good number of people that have graduated to work for our current president, whom has a horrible approval rating (and himself is a bit scary in that he trusts so much in sky faries and other delusions). I like the Pilot only for stories involving local issues, on a national level I use other news sources. To me the comments are the interesting part of the stories.
Can the Pilot be a beacon on light in this area?
Hopefully after this is all said and done, a kinder and more progressive paper will emerge. One that chooses to leave the tabloid reporting behind and focus instead on being a beacon of light for this area.
lowest common denominator bias
What else are you going do in a small town!
It's still a dying medium
Even if the overall market improves, it's still a newspaper, and newspapers will die a slow death despite forecasted 'improved' market conditions. I just hope they are fair to their employees and will reinstate merit increases.....I heard raises are frozen indefinitely for the time being.
Doing the happy dance here !
YES !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! What great news to wake up to !! I hope the first people from the Pilot to go are the liberals who edit these posts and delete my conservative opinions because they aren't "politically correct"!
I'm so excited I don't know whether to keep doing the happy dance or go eat breakfast ! LOL
We won't ever get a real
We won't ever get a real "news"paper without a leftist bias. Reason number one: the country has tilted so far to the left (after decades of media/hollywood/government pushing) that the true center now appears, from our vantage point, to be extreme right. Reason number two: our media gave up reporting long ago; it is now in the business of choosing, and leading, social movements. Power corrupts, and the media simply will never volunteer to give up this power.
To the Owners:
So if the current owners will retain the Pilot, maybe now they will listen to all those like myself who take offense that the forum for expressing differing points of view on many issues is gone from Sunday's paper and some artist's doodlings remain in that spot.
While I admit that not every one (myself included) who expressed views in the Sunday Commentary section was a rocket scientist, to replace that forum with those sketches seemed to say: No More Democratic Process - No more differing views, no more public forum for debate. It reminded me of how Rush Limbaugh would say he’d tell you the important events and what to think about them.
So, if you can the sketch artist and let the readers give you (free) Letters to the Editor all you need to do is group them by subject and print a few expressing differing points of view - maybe let a blogger submit an essay every week.
But please - the vapid sketches have to go.
The Batten Family
The current Mr. Batten is tight with Regent University--if he couldn't avoid a leftist slant, no one could. Actually, from the comments on this board, our community has taken a hard left rudder in the past decade, like Northern Virginia. Not all of us have gone along for the ride, so the conversations will be interesting, to say the least.
If the sale is on hold, are the lay offs on hold too?
125 people were laid off so that a bottome line could be achieved to get this sale to go through. Now that the sale is on hold, will the paper tell the people that got laid off 2 weeks ago that they can keep their jobs? I doubt it.
It's a shame, because people who spent 35 years being loyal to a company are not having the same loyalty shown to them.
Whether or not you believe that the paper is biased under the Batten family or not, laying off veteran journalists is going to greatly reduce the quality of the only daily local our growing metropolitan area has.
Newspapers might be in business to turn a profit, but they have more than just a responsibility to their stock holders. They have a responsibility to report the news to the public and treat their staff with respect, dignity and loyalty. If they can't honor those responsibilities they deserve to go bankrupt and crumble.
Frank Batten Sr. can be generous enough to donate $20 M to Norfolk Public library but what about the people that worked for him all of those years? Where is his generosity to them?
I was so close
I was so close, I had 30 payday loan shops about to close the deal each lending me $500, then they ran my credit. It would have been all mine! It would have been housing market doom & gloom 7 days a week.