Newspaper Layoffs and Norfolk's Sales and Tax Revenues

The Bad News

Landmark Media Enterprises LLC, owner of the Virginian-Pilot and Target Publications Media, which publishes Inside Business, Flagship and Apartment Book, is laying-off 32 employees by the end of the year.

David Mele, president and publisher of the newspaper, said the lay-offs are due to declines in advertising, according to a Pilotonline.com news brief this morning.

The batch of media companies has struggled to maintain gross margins of ten percent.

The cuts, Mele said, "will allow us to restructure our company and maintain the profitability required for continued innovation and growth" The Pilot said.

Earlier this year, billionaire investor, Warren Buffett, chairman of investment fund, Berkshire-Hathaway, bought the Greensboro News and Record and the Roanoke Times from Landmark, a privately held company. 

The Good News -- Generally

Sharon McDonald, Norfolk’s Commissioner of the Revenue, issued her department’s annual sales and revenue report for the last fiscal year, which ended June 30, 2013.  

Following five years of gradual declines of the city’s key financial indicators, McDonald said the city has experienced its second consecutive year of increases in retail sales, total sales and tax revenues

Sales, total sales and tax revenues increased in every district in the city, except for Granby Street and Waterside, she said in the report. 

Although Granby Street generated some positive signs primarily because of the presence of Urban Outfitters, the city still faces the challenge of filling the many store-front vacancies and providing assistance to the chef-owned restaurants, she said. 

Waterside will continue to show declines in sales and tax revenues for at least another two years until the downtown icon is restored as a waterfront entertainment and restaurant venue, McDonald said.

Waterside is one of three downtown projects, including the National Maritime Center and the cruise pier, that are still being supported financially by taxpayer subsidies, McDonald said.

Other Media

The name of Hampton Roads Magazine has been changed to Coastal Virginia Mag, though the Web address is still www.hamptonroadsmag.com. Vistagraphics, the publisher of the regional monthly magazine, has been re-branded to reflect efforts by local tourism departments to advertise the region as “Coastal Virginia” rather than Hampton Roads. The Peninsula (which is a peninsula, not a coast) should be miffed by the name. Darden Publishing also publishes a Coastal Virginia magazine. Could this present a conflict?