Well, if other McClatchy outlets are any guide, after job cuts on the spending side, we’ll get further stabs at cost reductions in the form of fewer “neighbors” sections and a hike in the newsstand price.
Two things, though. The Charlotte Weekly seems to be going great gangbusters at the precise moment Creative Loafing awaits word from a Florida bankruptcy judge on the alt-weekly chain’s future. At the extreme the local Loafing goes poof, leaving the Weekly to scoop all the ads that are not for sex toys. McClatchy just sits and spins now that its Eye product is gone.
Also worth noting that Loafing’s hammerlock on the bar-nite spot biz is basically what doomed the Charlotte edition of The Rhino Times. The Gboro parent feasts on such rich fare week after week, printing a thick book. This means that there should always enough ad fare out of this sector to support a CLT weekly, but who and what it might be could be subject to change.
Update: The bankruptcy judge gave CL’s leadership a few more months to pull things together, actually citing Web traffic numbers as a positive sign. I’m pretty sure taking Web metrics into evidence is the Final Sign of End Times. But now it is official: Ben Eason is a Web guru.
