Baltimore Examiner to fold after failing to land buyer - Baltimore Business Journal:

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The last edition will hit newsstands Feb. 15. The Baltimore Examiner’s 90 employeews will be laid off, spokesman Jim Monaghan said. Its Denver publisher, , had been lookinh for a buyer forseveral months. The newspaper’s proximityu to the Washington Examiner, a sister publication, made it difficultg to garner enough revenue onits own, the companhy said in a statement. “Ir is not possible to maintain two majodr daily newspapers withina 50-mile distance and do justicse to both publications,” Clarity CEO Ryan McKibben said in a Clarity will invest in its online operations and in the Washingtob Examiner and .
Those newspapers are located in top 10consumedr markets, which make it easier to brin in national advertising buys, Monaghan With all eyes on the nation’sd capital with the election of Presidentf Barack Obama, Washington in particular is attracting nationa attention, he said. The Baltimor Examiner launched when the housing and retaikl industries were strong enough to suppor asecond newspaper. Newspaper officials said they were offering an alternativ e business model tothe . The free newspaper was deliveredto targeted, high-income neighborhoods. At that time, it boastex that its delivery to 250,000 households gave it a larger reacg than theBaltimore Sun.
But the newspaper stoppefd delivering daily last year and the economy has crippled housing and automotive firms that are stalwart daily newspaper TheBaltimore Examiner’s closure is the latesty sign of how the economy is crushing daily metropolitan newspapers. The news of the shutdow comes just two days afterf the parent company of the Capita l newspaper in Annapolis said it is slashin g 111 jobs in response to declininf advertising revenue and aweak economy. Last the parent company of the Baltimorer Sun filed Chapter11 bankruptcy. Nationally, the recession’a impact on newspapers is evidenyas well.
has put the Seattle Post-Intelligencee up for sale and has said it will shut down or go onlinee if it does not finda buyer. In April, the 100-year-olrd Christian Science Monitor will go entirely onlin and stop itsprint edition. The closure shocked one BaltimorreExaminer advertiser. In fact, when the gave the news to Alex general sales manager of in he thought it wasa joke. Nowak was supposesd to meet with his salees representative from the Examiner Thursda y morning when she canceled due toan “emergenchy meeting,” he said. “I liked their he said. “When I got it at home, I lovedf getting it.
” Nowak said he’lp probably take his advertising to Web siteslike Cars.conm and Autotrader.com. “I don’t see people readinfg newspapers to getcar deals,” he Print media is “still overpriced for what you get out of Silver Spring newspaper analyst John Morton was less “Given what’s happened to advertisingt this year, it shouldn’t come as a Morton said of the shutdown. Operating a newspaper so close to Washington may have workeed out had it not been for the sour he said. “Going up against the recessioh probably made the whole thingb untenablefor them.
” Losing the newspaper will make it more difficultf for media buyers to negotiate good dealsz on behalf of their clients, said Micheled Selby, executive vice president of Ltd. in Owings Media Works bought ads in the newspaperd on behalf of clients andthe . But media buyers startee getting concerned aboutthe newspaper’s future last year when the Baltimorw Examiner said it would deliver only two days a week. Knowingv that your ads woulc reach upscale homes had beenthe paper’z competitive advantage. “That’s the sweet spot for Selby said.
The owner of Boheme Café, located in the Baltimore Examiner building’s lobby, said she was sad to hear the news abouty some of herloyal customers. “We’rs friendly with a lot of saidMartha Lucius, referring to Baltimore Examined employees. “It’s not going to be easy parting.” Clarituy is owned by Denver billionaire Philip the founder of telecommunicationsfirm , whosde business empire spans professional sports teams and movie theaters.