By: Allan Wolper Is Newspaper Afraid Of Offending Retail Advertisers?
The New York Daily News has iced an investigation on local
sweatshops -- prompting newsroom fears the newspaper is holding
back the highly anticipated report for fear of offending retail
department store advertisers.
The sweatshop expose by J. Robert Port examined whether New York
City designers who sold their clothing to department stores had
their wares manufactured in sweatshops. Port learned that
sweatshop owners kept their misdeeds secret by quickly paying off
fines levied by the Department of Labor, according to a well
placed retail industry source.
The series was scheduled to run in mid-May, but was postponed
after many of the city's supermarkets pulled their ads in
response to the Daily News' May 3 expose titled, "Dirty
Rotten Shame," according to newsroom sources.
Daily News Editor in Chief Edward Kosner dismissed
newsroom concerns about whether the paper was caving in to
pressure by the paper's advertising and business executives. "The
series is running so you can relax," he told E&P. "I can't
tell you when for competitive reasons. There is no newsroom buzz
about this. We run one big series at a time."
Port declined to discuss what he had written or when it might
run, noting that he was in an awkward position.
"My editors asked that I refer all telephone calls to public
relations," he said. "But I also think that people running a
newspaper deserve to make their decisions independently and
privately separate from external forces."
Lori Rose, vice president of media relations for the New York
office of Saks Fifth Avenue Enterprises, said Port had contacted
her in early May for a comment about where her designers made
their clothes.
"It's wasn't an issue that we confronted because we get our
clothes made from high-end designers," she said. "Still I wanted
him to know that we want our vendors to comply with the law. But
when I called him [Port] back with a statement, he said the
series had been postponed."
Daily News reporters aware of the series holdup worry that
the newspaper is censoring itself to avoid a reprise of the
recent supermarket inspection debacle, which first won the paper
citywide applause followed by a chorus of media criticism.
The supermarket probe alleged the food stores were so dirty they
couldn't pass state health inspections. Then from June 13-15 the
Daily News --hoping to win back the grocery store ad
revenue -- trivialized the expose with a series of advertorials,
that among other things, criticized governmental regulations on
supermarkets. The New York Times later reported that the
Daily News paid for the advertising supplement itself.
Allan Wolper (alfyjournal@msn.com) is a contributing editor to E&P.
Related story:
GROCERS PULL ADS FROM NY DAILY NEWS (05/15/01)
Copyright 2001, Editor & Publisher.
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