Late last month, leaders of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel’s parent company announced a merger with the E. W. Scripps corporation of Cincinnati. The deal combines print operations into a 14-newspaper business called Journal Media Group. It will also bring together broadcast media businesses into a separate company.
Since then, national and local analysts have been discussing what the merger will mean to the financial health of the companies, and what it will mean for local control of Milwaukee’s last daily print newspaper.
"Newspapers and newspaper companies are still figuring out the digital era that we're living in. In the past year or two even mobile devices are starting to exceed online use. All of the traditional media are trying to figure this out, but newspapers have been hurt the most," says reporter Rich Kirchen of the Milwaukee Business Journal.
With subscriptions to daily print continuing to decrease, the newspaper community has had to adapt or step aside. While Milwaukee has seen its fair share of mergers in major local companies such as Miller and M&I Bank, the new deal between Sentinel and E.W. Scripps is an effort to combine strengths in order to try and secure a place in the unpredictable future of media. However, whether this merger will be the key to the success of newspapers is yet to be seen. Perhaps we will read about it in our local newspaper.
