Thoughts on business coverage
Not a day goes by when some company's earnings report doesn't cross my desk or flash across my computer. Earnings are, after all, the bottom line for business. But it just isn't the bottom line for our business coverage these days.
The News & Record, and many other newspapers, used to cover industries, and the respective local companies, closely. I remember not too long ago when we had reporters covering "tobacco," "banking and insurance," "furniture," "textiles" and "retail." When local companies in these industries released their quarterly and yearly earnings reports, we wrote stories about them. When a new senior vice president was named, we wrote a story. Not so anymore.
Our own industry -- media -- is changing rapidly. The Internet and cable television have transformed the way people "consume" news. Much of what you read in the morning newspaper has been, in some form, on the Internet or TV for a period of hours previously. And, with the rapid expansion of blogs, chances are that information has already been analyzed or commented on by someone.
Hard-core business news is readily available at myriad Internet sites, from the individual companies to broader outlets such as Marketwatch.com or cnn.com or bloomberg.com. That includes earnings statements, mergers, acquisitions, corporate shuffling, etc.
The truth is, research shows that fewer people turn to the daily newspaper for their hard-core business news. Investors who want to know their financials' performance -- or corporate earnings -- get that information online anytime after the market's 4 p.m. close or on a number of financial-themed cable television channels. If you work for a publicly traded company, be it SBC or Jefferson Pilot, chances are you have checked either your company's Web site or intranet for the information you want.
A few newspapers have taken the dramatic step of ceasing to publish stock pages, or making it available as a separate "buy." We're not going in that direction for now, but we are changing the nature of business news you read in the News & Record. (Caveat: Keep in mind that this is all evolving and subject to some modification as we go along.)
The most important business news for us is local, and that will usually be found on the front page, or the front of the local section. These stories -- a new law school downtown, Dell coming to the Triad, major layoffs -- affect the greater community and deserve greater attention.
When developer Roy Carroll offered business writer Nate DeGraff a look inside the former Wachovia tower downtown and a glimpse of his plans, we made that the dominant story on A1. Don Patterson's lead A1 story this past Monday about the prospects of textile layoffs this year offered an authoritative and readable report on that industry's state of affairs.
We embrace bigger stories too. The News & Record's business coverage has entailed sending a reporter to China to chronicle the explosion of furniture manufacturing there and its impact on the community here. We sent a reporter to Mexico to look at how local textile companies were moving operations there.
We've done -- and will continue to do -- in-depth investigative series such as "The Unraveling," which examined the undoing of the very core of our manufacturing economy, and a series that looked at the emergence of the service economy in the Triad.
We broke news stories regularly during the state's long process of snaring the new Dell plant.
We write regularly about new developments, businesses and emerging trends.
These are all things that impact the local community in a major way, and we are committed to covering them in a major way.
And on the business page, stories are more focused on consumer-related issues, like personal finance and personal tech, shopping and development. You'll also find more helpful stories that offer tips or advice. Dr. Bombay, a popular feature that went away for a while, returns, starting Friday.
You're also going to see on that page the major business stories of the day, such as the recent mergers in the phone industry or the joining of P&G and Gillette. But those stories will be written more for the consumer than the business executive or investor.
Hard-core business news -- earnings and the like -- will run from time to time, but it will always be a judgment call weighed against what else is going on. Everything competes these days.
So far, the only complaints I've heard about our lack of earnings coverage has been from the companies themselves. But I'm listening for your thoughts. Talk back.
Comments (1)
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One of the complaints I've always had about business coverage in all newspapers, not just N&R, is the lack of coverage of local small businesses.
The reality is that most people in metropolitan areas work for small businesses. The reality of working in or running a small business can be quite different from working for one of the handful of local big businesses.
To name the obvious: health benefits. Most small businesses simply can't afford to provide good health benefits anymore. Many will cover their employee but transfer the burden for covering the employee's family back to the employee. Consequently the employee is often paying more in health premiums than they do for their other major expenses like car payments.
This is a huge story that a local paper could cover with great depth. They can answer questions like:
1. What local resources are available to help families deal with health issues?
2. What are these medical savings accounts all about? Where can a small biz owner go for information? Where can a small biz employee go for information?
3. Compare the cost of self insuring to the cost of what the average small biz can provide, and which is cheaper?
4. Does self insuring open an individual to more benefits from the government?
That's just one issue on the small business front.
You mention the not-so-distant past when stories were focused on local industries like textiles and tobacco. While that is interesting on the macro level I think you're missing a lot of relevant stories on the micro level that your readers would find valuable in their day-to-day work lives.
And please note that I'm not talking about entrepreneurial pieces focused on business ownership; I'm talking about the unique challenges faced by all of us who work for a small business in addition to the challenges of those running a small business. That's the piece that I think has been completely missed by all the business media.
Posted on February 25, 2005 11:48 AM