Lee Enterprises – owner of the Quad City Times and 47 other daily newspapers – today (1/22) reported first quarter earnings of 28 cents per share, down from 32 cents per share for the same period a year ago.
Overall print and digital advertising revenue for the quarter – normally the newspaper industry's strongest advertising period because of the holiday shopping season – fell 6.3 percent compared with the company's first quarter last year.
Digital ad revenue increased 4.8 percent to $16.3 million compared with the first quarter last year, helping offset some of the 7.7 percent drop in print advertising revenue. Circulation revenue also increased nearly 4 percent as Lee put in place paywalls at nearly all of its online news sites during the past 12 months.
During the first quarter, Lee also paid down an additional $29 million on its debt, which totaled $917 million as of Dec. 30. Cash interest on the debt totaled $21.85 million for the quarter.
Operating expenses for the period decreased 4 percent compared with the year earlier thanks to an 8.1 percent reduction in employees, a 13.1 percent decrease in newsprint and ink expense and a 12.6 percent reduction in newsprint volume.
In its quarterly earnings release, the company also disclosed it had reached an agreement to sell The Garden Island newspaper and its online site www.kauaiworld.com of Lihue, HI to Oahu Publications for $2 million. The sale is expected to be completed next month. Last year, Lee sold its North County (CA) Times newspaper and online news site for $11.95 million.
The company also said it plans to begin using the Google DoubleClick advertising platform for all of its online news sites in the coming quarter. DoubleClick is the leading online ad serving company providing software to web sites and advertisers to serve ads, track usage and help target ads to web site users.
CLICK HERE to download the full first quarter financial release.
