Oregon Media Insiders

And as long as I was digging around at JournalismJobs.com, I thought I'd get myself set up via RSS to see who's advertising for people in the state. Here's the PBJ's advertisement for Managing Editor, posted last week:

The Portland Business Journal is searching for a managing editor who can help make one of the nation's top-notch business weeklies even better. We are looking for an accomplished reporter and writer who is also a great teacher and a strong manager, capable of inspiring our highly skilled staff. The successful candidate will be a collaborator who gets energized by working in a team environment that values creativity, critical thinking and the highest professional standards. Organizational skills are also a plus, as the managing editor shares responsibility for newsroom operations.

Apparently business reporters are the flavor of the day; the Bend Bulletin and the DJC are hiring too.

When I saw New Season Foods Inc. Sold come across my PBJ newsfeed this morning, I just about jumped out of my skin. Nooo! Not my market! Not again! Not like Nature's!

Then I read the piece and realized it wasn't the market, it was a processor of materials for instant soup. Unfortunately, KGW didn't read the article very closely and ran a story that New Seasons MARKET had been sold, forcing the market to run the screenshot to the right.

The PBJ wrote to draw my attention to an article behind the paywall: As venerated longtime retailer Meier & Frank becomes Macy's, Macy's ad plan could hurt 'O':

If [new M&F owner] Federated's print advertising drops to 40 percent of its budget -- as expected -- The Oregonian could lose more than $2 million in annual revenue. Sources in Portland's advertising community say the change is already taking place.

To put that in perspective, the Akron Beacon Journal laid off 39 newsroom employees -- a nearly 25 percent reduction -- in order to make up for the loss of $2.3 million in ad revenue, according to a recent story in the Cleveland Plain Dealer.

The reason for the loss in revenue: The paper's biggest advertiser -- Kaufmann's -- had converted to Macy's. ...

Oregonian Publisher Fred Stickel, through an assistant, said the paper has been given no indication that Federated and its Macy's brand will advertise less than Meier & Frank. In fact, he remained confident the store would increase its local print advertising. The paper has long had an informal no-layoffs policy in its newsroom. ...

Analysts say it makes sense for Federated to spend more money on radio and television spots now that Macy's is a national brand.

"[Macy's] probably won't do as much [local advertising] as Meier & Frank did," said Kip Cassino, a media analyst and vice president at Va.-based Borrell Associates Inc. "They're a national retail company and they feel that their local advertising is buttressed by the national [radio and television] spots they buy." ...

Experts, such as Cassino, say newspapers no longer attract the young readers that retailers covet.

The article notes that despite declines in Oregonian print readership, OregonLive.com readership is up from 5% of Portland residents to 10% in the last year. (Attention Newhouse/Advance: Put the photos in the stories online and watch that percentage rise some more.)

The PBJ and the O are both owned by Newhouse/Advance.

Paul Allen's Vulcan Sports Media is selling its radio, internet and print properties to American City Business Journals for an undisclosed sum:

"Sporting News is a strong brand that we believe has considerable upside in print, online and on-air platforms," said Ray Shaw, American City chairman and CEO.

Sporting News magazine, which is based in St. Louis, has been published without interruption since 1886 and currently reaches 700,000 subscribers and 3.9 million total readers every week. It was named to Adweek magazine's "Hot List" as one of the country's top magazines in 2004 and 2005.

The company's publishing, online and radio network units were assembled through a series of acquisitions in 2000 and 2001. In 2000, Vulcan acquired the publishing and online units from Times Mirror Co. and bought the radio network operations of One-on-One Sports later that year. It added online fantasy games company Small World Sports in May 2001.

Allen also owns Rose City Radio, aka KXL--for now, anyway. ACBJ publishes the Portland Business Journal, and is itself owned by Newhouse/Advance, the owners of the Oregonian. (See why I hate media consolidation so much? It makes for too much typing.) The deal is expected to close in October.

Definitely a webby zeitgeist out there, as Portland's favorite business paper named after a sandwich announces web changes of its own:

Beginning Monday, July 24, the Portland Business Journal will begin rolling out a strategy that will enable its print subscribers to view all news and feature copy of the current print edition on the newspaper's Web site.

Until now, only a limited amount of content from the print edition has been posted on line, said Publisher Craig Wessel, and the decision to make virtually all content immediately available was made to further enhance the value of subscribing to the Portland Business Journal. ...

SmallTownPapers fills a gap company officials say:

"Newspapers from small towns have long been overlooked by media and information gathering industries such as news services because it was too expensive to gather small-market news. STPNS gives these newspapers a way to share their news and information with the world and gives consumers and organizations an easy way to access local content of interest to them," said Paul Jeffko, president and founder of SmallTownPapers, in a statement.

SmallTownPapers compiles and scans the content of more than 250 small U.S. newspapers.

No high school cheerleader carwash is safe!

The latest Fas-Fax data is out, and it's not encouraging for the O:

In a six-month period ending March 31, The Oregonian's weekday circulation dropped from 333,515 to 323,017 and Sunday circulation dropped from 394,992 to 384,729.

That was a larger decrease than the newspaper experienced in the six months ending Sept. 30, 2005, when weekday circulation dropped from 337,707 and Sunday circulation dropped from 405,295.