Philip Walzer reports:
The Virginian-Pilot won’t be sold. At least for now.
The owner of The Pilot, Landmark Media Enterprises LLC, announced Tuesday that it had taken the newspaper and its affiliates off the market, citing the credit crunch.
Landmark, however, intends to resume the sale process for The Virginian-Pilot Media Cos. when the economy improves, said Richard F. Barry III, the company’s vice chairman. The company, he said, will remain open to offers in the meantime.
If you want to buy a newspaper in the U.S. this is one of the best options available.
The paper is well-known for its first-class design, photojournalism and local reporting.
If I were the adviser to any foreign buyer looking for great U.S. newspapers, the Pilot would be one of my top recommendations.
It’s a shame that no other U.S. newspaper group is willing to buy it, and it shows how lost these companies are.
Perhaps Landmark is asking for too much money, but my feeling is that this and other sales won’t go forward not because there’s not enough money, but because there’s not enough faith in the future of print newspapers.
This is the real crisis of U.S. newspapers.
So, perhaps Landmark can reconsider the sale process and re-invest in the future of what is not just a newspaper business, but a great social institution with deep roots in this vibrant community.
(In the Virginian-Pilot picture by Rich-Joseph Facun: Evan Burgoon, 5, watches his father Lt Cmdr. Ian Burgoon of the VFA 211 land at the Oceana Naval Air Station in Virginia Beach, VA, Tuesday, December 18, 2007. The squadrons returned home to Hampton Roads following a six-month deployment aboard the aircraft carrier USS Enterprise. The strike group spent 13 of the last 20 months at sea supporting troops in Iraq and Afghanistan)