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PART I
Item 1. Business.
The principal business activities of The Washington Post Company (the ""Company'') consist of newspaper publishing
(principally
The Washington Post
), television broadcasting (through the ownership and operation of six television
broadcast stations), the ownership and operation of cable television systems, magazine publishing (principally
Newsweek
magazine), and (through its Kaplan subsidiary) the provision of educational services.
Information concerning the consolidated operating revenues, consolidated income from operations and identifiable assets
attributable to the principal segments of the Company's business for the last three fiscal years is contained in Note N to the
Company's Consolidated Financial Statements appearing elsewhere in this Annual Report on Form 10-K. (Revenues for
each segment are shown in such Note N net of intersegment sales, which did not exceed 0.1% of consolidated operating
revenues.)
During each of the last three years the Company's operations in geographic areas outside the United States (consisting
primarily of Kaplan's foreign operations and the publication of the international editions of
Newsweek
) accounted for less
than 5% of the Company's consolidated revenues, and the identifiable assets attributable to such operations represented
approximately 6% of the Company's consolidated assets at December 28, 2003, and less than 2% of the Company's
consolidated assets at December 29, 2002, and December 30, 2001.
Newspaper Publishing
The Washington Post
WP Company LLC (""WP Company''), a subsidiary of the Company, publishes
The Washington Post,
which is a morning
and Sunday newspaper primarily distributed by home delivery in the Washington, D.C. metropolitan area, including large
portions of Virginia and Maryland.
The following table shows the average paid daily (including Saturday) and Sunday circulation of
The Post
for the twelve-
month periods ended September 30 in each of the last five years, as reported by the Audit Bureau of Circulations
(""ABC'') for the years 1999-2002 and as estimated by
The Post
for the twelve-month period ended September 30,
2003 (for which period ABC had not completed its audit as of the date of this report) from the semiannual publisher's
statements submitted to ABC for the six-month periods ended March 31, 2003 and September 30, 2003:
Average Paid Circulation
Daily Sunday
1999ÏÏÏÏÏÏÏÏÏÏÏÏ 775,005 1,085,060
2000ÏÏÏÏÏÏÏÏÏÏÏÏ 777,521 1,075,918
2001ÏÏÏÏÏÏÏÏÏÏÏÏ 771,614 1,066,723
2002ÏÏÏÏÏÏÏÏÏÏÏÏ 767,843 1,058,458
2003ÏÏÏÏÏÏÏÏÏÏÏÏ 753,845 1,039,644
The newsstand price for the daily newspaper was increased from $0.25 (which had been the price since 1981) to
$0.35 effective December 31, 2001. The newsstand price for the Sunday newspaper has been $1.50 since 1992. In
July 2003 the rate charged for home-delivered copies of the daily and Sunday newspaper for each four-week period was
increased to $13.44 from $12.60, which had been the rate since July 2002. The corresponding rate charged for
Sunday-only home delivery has been $6.00 since 1991.
General advertising rates were increased by an average of approximately 4.6% on January 1, 2003, and by
approximately another 5.3% on January 1, 2004. Rates for most categories of classified and retail advertising were
increased by an average of approximately 3.9% on February 1, 2003, and by approximately an additional 3.1% on
February 1, 2004.
The following table sets forth
The Post
's advertising inches (excluding preprints) and number of preprints for the past five
years:
1999 2000 2001 2002 2003
Total Inches (in thousands) ÏÏÏÏ 3,288 3,363 2,714 2,657 2,675
Full-Run Inches ÏÏÏÏÏÏÏÏÏÏÏÏÏ 2,745 2,634 2,296 2,180 2,121
Part-Run Inches ÏÏÏÏÏÏÏÏÏÏÏÏ 543 729 418 477 554
Preprints (in millions) ÏÏÏÏÏÏÏÏÏ 1,647 1,602 1,556 1,656 1,835
WP Company also publishes
The Washington Post National Weekly Edition,
a tabloid that contains selected articles and
features from
The Washington Post
edited for a national audience. The
National Weekly Edition
has a basic subscription
price of $78 per year and is delivered by second class mail to approximately 46,000 subscribers.
2003 FORM 10-K 1