Washington Post 2011 Annual Report Download - page 32

carriers and commercial mobile radio service providers must port numbers that they control to an interconnected VoIP
service provider upon a valid port request. Cable ONE, along with other providers of interconnected VoIP service, must
contribute funds to cover the shared costs of local number portability and the costs of North American Numbering Plan
Administration. The FCC currently is considering whether additional numbering requirements, such as allowing consumers
access to abbreviated dialing codes like 211 and 311, should be applied to interconnected VoIP service providers.
Although consumers’ ability to port their existing telephone numbers to interconnected VoIP service has created additional
opportunities for Cable ONE to gain voice customers, the local number portability and associated rules overall have had
the effect of increasing the cost of providing VoIP service.
Newspaper Publishing
The Company’s newspaper publishing operations include results for its flagship newspaper and Internet site, The
Washington Post, The Slate Group and a number of additional newspapers and websites.
The Washington Post
WP Company LLC (WP Company), a subsidiary of the Company, publishes The Washington Post (the Post), which is a
morning daily and Sunday newspaper primarily distributed by home delivery in the Washington, DC, metropolitan area,
including large portions of Maryland and northern Virginia. The Post’s two primary sources of revenue are advertising and
subscription fees, which accounted for 63% and 34% of its total revenue in 2011, respectively. Advertising revenue is
derived from the sale of display and classified advertisements, as well as the insertion and other distribution of preprinted
advertisements.
The following table shows the average paid daily (including Saturday) and Sunday circulation of the Post for the 52-week
period ended September 27, 2009, and the 53-week period ended October 3, 2010, as reported by the Audit Bureau
of Circulations (ABC) and as estimated by the Post for the 52-week period ended October 2, 2011, 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 26-week period ended April 3, 2011, and the 26-week period ended October 2, 2011:
Average Paid
Circulation
Daily Sunday
2009 ................................................... 615,353 845,588
2010 ................................................... 556,676 780,849
2011 ................................................... 524,078 739,202
The Post’s primary circulation territory accounts for more than 90% of its daily and Sunday circulation and consists of
Washington, DC, and communities generally within a 50-mile radius from the city, but excluding Baltimore City and its
northern and eastern suburbs. The current newsstand price in this area is $1.00 for the daily newspaper after a $0.25
increase effective January 16, 2012, and $2.00 for the Sunday newspaper. The rate charged for each four-week period
for home-delivered copies of the daily and Sunday newspaper was raised to $25.40 effective January 16, 2012, from
$23.48, which was effective on March 14, 2011. The rate charged for Sunday-only home delivery has been $7.40 for
each four-week period since January 18, 2010. Outside the primary circulation area, the current newsstand price is
$1.00 for the daily newspaper and $2.50 for the Sunday newspaper. Rates for home-delivered copies of the daily and
Sunday newspaper outside the primary circulation area for each four-week period are $34.00, and $10.00 for the
Sunday newspaper only.
WP Company also publishes the newspaper’s Internet site, washingtonpost.com, that currently features much of the full
editorial text of the Post and most of the its classified advertising, as well as original content, blogs written by Post
reporters and others, interactive discussions hosted by Post reporters and outside subject experts, user-generated comments
and content obtained from other sources. The Internet site also features extensive information about activities, groups and
businesses in the Washington, DC, area, including arts and entertainment and news focusing on politics and on
technology businesses and related policy issues.
As measured by WP Company, this site averaged more than 273.4 million page views per month and had an average
of 35.7 million unique visitors per month during 2011. This site has developed a substantial audience of visitors who are
outside the Washington, DC, area, and WP Company believes, based on analytical data, that approximately 89% of
the unique visitors who access the site each month are in that category. WP Company provides online advertisers with a
wide range of options, including the ability to advertise on select pages or page combinations or to target specific
geographic areas and demographic groups. WP Company also provides content on websites specially formatted to be
downloaded and displayed on web-enabled cell phones and other personal digital devices. In addition to offering
20 THE WASHINGTON POST COMPANY