Washington Post 2003 Annual Report Download - page 12

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WPNI has now produced three years of large growth
in ad revenue in a depressed advertising environment.
As a web site with deep penetration of the Washington
area, twinned with a newspaper with the same extraor-
dinary reach, washingtonpost.com will have a good
local business, probably a little better (because of
reach) than that of other newspaper web sites. The site
also has some meaningful national/international
audience; we will see what we can
make of that.
Caroline Little became CEO and
publisher at WPNI as 2004 began.
Her predecessor, Chris Schroeder,
became vice president–strategy of The Washington
Post Company, advising me on corporate direction,
after three years in which he set lofty goals in traffic,
revenue and financial improvement—and met them
all. Caroline entered the job with the respect of every-
one at WPNI, The Post and Newsweek. WPNI has high
ambitions and brilliant people. Its competitive market-
place always will be challenging. Its success is crucially
important to the future of the company, and we could
not have better leadership.
✧
Post–Newsweek Stations had a down year in 2003.
While we are as shy of forecasting as ever, we can tell
you that 2004 will be better—Olympics and election
years are much better than odd-numbered years for
TV stations. Last year was a tough one; the poor
local TV advertising climate surprised me and
Post–Newsweek CEO Alan Frank. It was true of local
TV stations across the country.
There were bright spots; in particular, WKMG in
Orlando under Henry Maldonado began showing the
kind of ratings and profit growth we anticipated when
10 The Washington Post Company
able modem sales rocketed, reaching more than 15
percent of subscribers by year-end.
C