Advertisers face changes at the Globe
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Steve Chiotakis: The Boston Globe and its largest union have reportedly reached a deal to cut costs and keep the newspaper in business. And that has other businesses in Beantown breathing way easier: namely, advertisers. Some had been scrambling to figure out what to do in case the paper folded. Curt Nickisch reports.
Curt Nickisch: For all the talk about declining ad revenue in the newspaper industry, it’s still substantial. By sticking around, the Boston Globe will probably sell a few hundred million dollars worth of ads this year.
Lisa Adams works for a local ad buying agency. She says even with online advertising booming, it would be tough for her clients to drop the Globe. After all, she says, the paper lands on hundreds of thousands doorsteps a day, and it reaches a half a million households on the weekend:
Lisa Adams: On Sunday, those families are sitting down, they’re holding that paper, and you’ve got somebody’s full attention. For that reason, you’re typically gonna have better impact.
But not every advertiser is relieved by the Globe’s new lease on life. Car dealer Ernie Boch, Jr. says his ad buys with the paper have fallen off considerably since its heyday.
Ernie Boch Jr.: In the 80’s and 90’s, the Globe was it. King! Nobody sold more cars than the Globe.
If anything, Boch says, the newspaper’s brush with death has only ended up scaring advertisers. The Globe may be staying around, but it’s probably going to have a smaller reach and a different look once management gets done with cutting costs.
In Boston, I’m Curt Nickisch, for Marketplace.
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