Cribb, Greene Publisher Confidence Survey Results Less Optimistic

The Fall 2011 Cribb, Greene Publisher Confidence Survey results show that newspaper owners and executives are more pessimistic than a year ago about near-term performance, but are surprisingly positive in a few areas.  The Survey polled 165 newspaper owners, publishers and executives to find out how they feel about their markets and profit/revenue performance this year and in 2012, and other topics.  Forty-seven percent of respondents operate daily newspapers or daily/weekly clusters and 53% operate primarily weekly publications.

Most respondents think their local market economies are performing about the same as last year (60%) but the number who think performance is improving dropped from 37% in 2010 to 14% this year.  Twenty-six percent say their market is declining.

Nearly half believe their bottom line performance will stay about the same in 2012 (47%) but 39% think profits will improve.  Fourteen percent think profits will decrease.  As the economy improves more respondents believe that profit will be better than in the past - 46% which is significantly up from 39% in 2010.  Those who feel profits will be lower than in the past remains the same as 2010 at 33%.

Fewer newspaper executives estimate that advertising revenues will be up in 2012, with 37% indicating an ad revenue increase next year - down from 51% last Fall.  More respondents think ad revenues will be about the same next year (44%) and 19% think they will be down.

Publishers with their own web press continue to be split roughly 50-50 on whether they would eliminate the press and outsource printing.

Interesting that exactly the same percentage of respondents as in 2010 would consider purchasing a newspaper business - 46% say they would and 54% say they would not.  Those that would buy a newspaper are increasingly interested in Seller Financing - now 52% of respondents compared to 40% last year.  But publishers are still fairly comfortable they can obtain bank financing  on reasonable terms - as 57% believe financing is available and 43% say it is not, which is similar to last year's responses.

The "litmus test" question of "Would you recommend the newspaper business as a career for your children?" remains at almost exactly the same response level as in 2010.  Thirty-two percent say "yes", they would suggest newspapers as a career and 30% say "maybe, meaning that 62% would or might suggest this industry as a career path.  Thirty-eight percent say "No".

See image gallery for complete results of the Fall 2011 Cribb, Greene Publisher Confidence Survey.