A 'Window' Into Challenges Faced By Gay Papers

By: Mark Fitzgerald When Chris Crain and William Waybourn founded Window Media in 1996, they had ambitions of creating the first nationwide chain of gay newspapers.

"That remains the objective of the company to this day," Crain insisted in an interview this week. It's just, he added, that a lot has changed since 1996, for the newspaper business; for the gay and lesbian audience Window Media papers target -- and for the company itself.

Last week saw the biggest change at the company that publishes the Washington Blade, Southern Voice, and a half-dozen other publications and Web services.

Window announced that co-founder Waybourn was leaving the company, and being replaced as president by Peter Polimino, the CFO of Avalon Equity Partners -- the New York City-based venture fund that has been the newspaper chain's majority stakeholder since 2001.

The natural implication was that the chain's principal investor was getting antsy about the performance of its gay papers and Web sites.

As word of Waybourn's departure spread in gay media circles, some reports linked it with far more massive changes at the chain. Freelance writer Bob Roehr, in a Jan. 30 story that raced around the Web with the headline "Gay Publishing Chain Fires Senior Staff," wrote: "There is blood all over the floor at Window Media as staff has been axed in at attempt to raise profits at the gay media company that owns
publications in several markets." Waybourn, Roehr added, "was the first head to roll." The story hinted that Crain might be next.

In a press release announcing what it called his retirement, Window cited the usual desire to "pursue other interests" but said the former president would remain an investor in the company.

"It's unfair that I will get much of the credit for their hard work to make our publications the best in the gay press, and the alternative press as well," Waybourn said in a statement. Crain, who is Window's executive vice president for editorial and production, issued his own statement: "There would be no Window Media without William Waybourn. He has guided these publications and the people behind them through good times and bad. We are grateful for his leadership and wish him all success."

In their joint telephone interview with E&P, neither Crain nor Polimino would comment about Waybourn much beyond those statements -- and they were at pains to portray top management stability.

"He's retiring from the company and moving on to other things," Crain said. "Peter is now in the position of president, and the rest of the management team is the same as it was: Mike Kitchens is the COO; Steve Guerrini is in charge of sales; and Steve Meyers is the CFO."

Other departures were coincidental or long planned, Crain said. The company's D.C.-based controller, for instance, had been aware for about a year that all accounting functions would be consolidated in Atlanta, where Window publishes Southern Voice, he said. And Southern Voice Editor Matt Hennie left because he found a position outside of journalism, Crain said. None were terminations, he added.

And Polimino said he planned no radical changes in operations. "We're going to use this distributive model, decentralized ... [but] centralize all that makes sense," he said. "Sales and editorial will stay closer to their markets. Chris will do a lot of the day-to-day oversight of the products. The company is not going to change the way it has operated. All we're looking to do is give them more resources and tools."

After all, Polimino added, "We're a newspaper like anybody else, and you know as well as anyone the newspaper business is different than it was 10 years ago."

Window has seen its share of ups and down. There was a staff revolt after it took over the D.C. Blade, which resulted in a failed attempt at unionization. The chain's New Orleans paper folded long before Hurricane Katrina scattered its audience.

More recently, Window began syndicated a news ticker for gay-oriented Web sites, and it partnered in New York City with the publisher of HX, a popular gay bar and entertainment guide.

Window, which publishes the New York Blade, and HX Media created Unite HX, dedicated to growing both publications through cross-selling and other strategies. "We're looking for more of these strategic non-cash transactions," Polimino said.

In recent years, the dynamics of the gay newspaper audience have changed, too -- raising the question of whether gay papers are still positioned as the best way to reach the so-called GLBT (gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender) community.

Twenty years ago, and even as recently as ten years ago, when Crain and Waybourn started Window Media, local gay papers were just about the only entree advertisers had to the GLBT market, and the only real source of gay-oriented news. "People in the GLBT community had to rely on all those papers for information, for example, about HIV/AIDS," said Bill Dobbs, a New York City gay activist. "The Washington Blade became the de facto national paper of record, mostly because it was in D.C. without a lot of competition, it got fat with ads' and it had a big newshole."

Soon enough, though -- and, ironically, in many ways because the gay press trumpeted the affluence of its market -- mainstream media and mainstream business began targeting gays and lesbians. Mainstream newspapers also began making their newsrooms more comfortable for gay journalists with domestic partner benefits.

Speaking the morning that the gay-themed film "Brokeback Mountain" received eight Oscar nominations, Polimino and Crain acknowledged the mainstream coverage of gay issues, but said it wasn't having a big effect on the gay press.

"I've never felt too significant a challenge [from] the mainstream press," Crain said. "We cover stories in ways that are different than the mainstream press ... with more depth and different angles. The positive about [the mainstream press] giving more attention is that it debunks myths -- and makes it easier to sell [corporations] on advertising" in the gay press.

Polimino said that privately held Window has doubled in size since 2001 through a combination of acquisitions, revenue growth, and "better execution."

"We've been somewhat insulated from the deterioration," he said. Readers of gay newspapers are more loyal than mainstream newspaper readers, he said. As for other gay papers, he added, "not too many are of the quality that window puts up, so I think we're well-positioned to grow."

The direction, though, is likely to take a course through cyberspace rather than an offset press.

Within the next few months, Crain said, Window will launch a "new generation" of Web sites that will handle the breaking news while printed newspapers "reflect on what's beyond the headlines." There will be a "soft redesign" of print newspapers at the same time, he said.

"The Web gives us ways to grow we had not even thought of in 1996," Crain said. "It has a potential to go even beyond the big city dailies." The D.C. Blade, he said, in many ways is already a national publication because "we have an audience that is not limited by geography. Just like the New York Times, or the Washington Post."