A MUST READ: Betting on David Black

Just posted today on Seattle.com is a MUST READ story by Don Ward on Publisher David Black.

The article is headlined “Betting on David Black."

The subtitle asks the question:

Major dailies are shedding employees, hemorrhaging cash, and losing advertisers to the Web. So why is David Black swimming in ink?

Black owns 32 papers in the Puget Sound area, Most people couldn’t tell you who David Holmes Black is. “But this month, around a million households in Washington will have a Black-owned newspaper land in their front yard, or those householders will pick one up at the local 7-Eleven so they can see which local kid won the Soap Box Derby or check the classifieds for a '77 Camaro.”

Wikipedia has only a single 94-word entry on the 62-year-old Canadian publisher.

David Black admits he prefers anonymity. "We're not a publicly held company," he demurs. "There's no reason to interview me."

Situated in his office in Victoria, B.C., Black works nine-hour days, a good deal fewer than when he was younger, giving him more time to indulge his hobbies: sailing, golf, and tooling around in his old Jaguar. In person, a poker player would be stumped by Black's demeanor, because he lacks any tells. Munching on a cookie at his desk, Black downplays his past triumphs, giving the impression that it's no great accomplishment that his media empire is not only profitable but expanding while other newspaper chains are currently bleeding red ink.

"Where else are you going to get an organization where the CEO answers the phone himself?" says Manfred Tempelmayr, president of Black-owned subsidiary Sound Publishing, who has known Black for two decades.

The supposed decline of print media is not in fact an industry-wide phenomenon. Community newspapers have generally been profitable ventures for some time, and over the past decade have attracted the attention of media giants looking for publications that can positively contribute to the parent corporation's bottom line.

Click on the headline to read the full story.