E.W. Scripps CEO Boehne: 'Nowhere to Hide'

By: E&P Staff E.W. Scripps announced today a loss from continuing operations of $19.4 million in Q4, compared to the same period a year ago.

Revenue at the company, which includes television stations and newspapers, dropped 6% to $265 million in Q4.

The company also took a $41.9 million write-down mainly on its TV assets and its newspaper partnership in Denver. Scripps put the Rocky Mountain News and its interest in the joint operating agreement up for sale and expects to announce plans for the future of the paper by the end of Q1.

"It became apparent toward the end of the year there's nowhere to hide from the national economic crisis," Rich Boehne, president and CEO of Scripps, said in a statement. "Despite our geographic diversity and multiple sources of advertising revenue, we're feeling the pain as the recession rolls its way through our local markets and media businesses."

For newspapers managed solely by Scripps, revenue declined 16.5% to $137.5 million. Advertising revenue was down almost 20% to $104.8 million.

Online revenue skidded 13.1% to $8 million. Scripps said the decline was due mainly to bundled classified ads. Revenue from online-only sales more than doubled to $3.7 million.

Classified revenue plunged 31.2% to $27.7 million. Local was down 15.1% to $32.1 million. National decreased 18% to $7.5 million. Preprint revenue fell 13.8% to $29.5 million.

Circulation revenue was down 3.9% to $28.3 million.

Segment profit at newspapers managed solely by Scripps was $12.9 million compared with $37.3 million in Q4 of 2007.

On Wednesday, Scripps told its employees it would cut wages by 3% to 5% and freeze 401K matches and pension contributions.