Schurz COMMUNICATOR January 2013 Danville hosts V-P debate again ~ Stories pages 4-5 What’s on the inside The nation’s spotlight focused on several geographic areas this fall in which Schurz Franklin D. Schurz, Communications properties are located. Jr., retired former Danville, KY shown the brightest when it hosted the 2012 Vice Presidential debate match- president of Schurz ing Democrat Joe Biden and Republican Paul Ryan. Communications, was honored as a “Partner That Danville, home to SCI’s Advocate-Messenger, was in Philanthropy” by selected for the debate is a remarkable achievement consider- Indiana University. He ing that vice presidential debates have historically gone to met- received the ropolitan areas…Houston, Philadelphia, Omaha, Atlanta, St. Cornerstone Award, Petersberg, Cleveland and St. Louis. Making the Danville which recognizes individuals whose selection even more remarkable is that this was the second voluntary involvement has been time for the community. It also hosted the Joe Lieberman-Dick instrumental in the success of an IU Chaney debate in 2000. philanthropic initiative. Story on page The debate not only attracted thousands of people to 8. Danville but got the city’s name in front of millions more The circulation of the Aberdeen watching it on television. The Biden-Ryan debate was the third American News’ most watched in history with 51.4 million viewers. Outdoor Forum Stories on the debate are on pages 4 and 5. jumped from 15,000 South Bend found itself in the national spotlight for a reason to 60,000 with the once almost traditional, but rare in recent years…the Fighting start of pheasant Irish football team. In the Knute Rockne, Frank Leahy, Ara Parseghian and Lou Holtz eras, hunting season in Notre Dame being atop the national football polls was almost commonplace. It hadn’t hap- South Dakota. The monthly magazine pened for 17 years, however, until Brian is distributed throughout the state. Kelly coached the Irish to an undefeated reg- The pheasant hunting issues also ular season this year. jumped in size from 32 pages to 64 Communicator The South Bend Tribune created pages. Story on page 11. on the Web Carol Maloney, wife of Bloomington NDInsider to be the prime source for Notre Herald-Times publish- Dame sports news in print and digitally and Each issue of the Schurz er Mayer Maloney, also published a hardback book on the Communicator is being made available electronically on the SCI website. Back was honored by the remarkable season. Stories on the Tribune’s issues can also be found on the site. Greater Bloomington initiatives are on page 9 plus a story on A reduced number of printed copies Chamber of WSBT Radio’s plans for coverage of the ofthe Communicator is being produced. Commerce with its national championship game. Between 10 and 35 printed copies are Catalyst Award for Another Indiana city with an SCI property sent to each SCI property and single bringing people was in the sports spotlight. The Indiana copies are mailed to retirees. together for great achievement. Carol started the 100+ University basketball team, located in Women Who Care organization in Bloomington, home of the Herald-Times, 2011. Story on page 14. was ranked No. 1 in the country for most of the first month of the season, before an overtime The Advocate-Messenger in loss to Butler. Reports on the Herald-Times coverage of the IU season will be in the April Danville, KY has Communicator. introduced a new Stories on page 7 are about three positions in the Schurz Communications organization that app, KY X-tra, for the have been filled. John Schurz has been named president/general manager of the Arizona smartphone or tablet Cable companies. Brian Green has replaced Schurz as president and general manager of the that will link some WASK Radio Group in Lafayette, IN. Green has been with WASK for 18 years, The other stories or photos in position is at the Imperial Valley Press in El Centro, CA. Duby Petit, who began her SCI the newspaper to dig- ital content such as career there 10 years ago, is returning as general manager, videos, additional photographs or Schurz Communications is looking for big ideas for the future of the media business and is links to additional online information. making $25,000 annual commitments to Notre Dame, Indiana and Purdue universities to Story on page 26. provide cash awards for innovative ideas produced by students at the universities. The first Longtime Danville Advocate- $3,500 award was made to students at Notre Dame. Story on page 8. Messenger Sports Editor Larry --Bill Schrader, Editor Vaught has been named winner of the 2013 Tom Hammond Kentucky Sports Media Award, On the cover which recognizes indi- The cover story for the January issue of the Schurz Communicator was an easy viduals who have selection with Danville, KY playing host to the 2012 Vice Presidential debate for the made an impact on second time since the nationally televised debates began in 1976. The debate the lives of attracted hundreds of media from around the world. One of the gymnasiums in Kentuckians. Vaught Sutcliffe Hall, on the Centre College campus, was converted into a media center with has been sports edi- row after row of tables where journalists could watch the debate on large monitors tor since 1996. Story on page 29. and write and file their reports. Stories on the debate are on pages 4 and 5. 2 Winter 2013 Schurz Communicator Budgeting a learning experience By TODD F. SCHURZ President/CEO Schurz Communication In all of my years of writing and reviewing budgets, I have never heard anyone tell me that they enjoy the process. We all know it is important and necessary, but it is not fun. TODD F. SCHURZ President/CEO So, let me start this year with a confession: I really enjoyed the Schurz reviews for this year’s budgets, Communications, Inc. Insight that comes largely due to some conversations from open dialogue we had during the process. Each of the publishers and general managers is invaluable shared the lessons he or she learned in 2012. I cannot list them all in this column, but I would share a few that particularly struck me. Revenue growth is still possible, but it is hard work -- whether it is --Changes in consumer behavior means we need to utilize our “twenty dials a day”, increasing the number of accounts, stopping assets differently unprofitable products, or providing new services. Our cable systems in Hagerstown, Maryland and Weston, Florida And we are seeing the results of those efforts - our publishing completed the move to all-digital systems (we will do the same in segment revenue declined by almost 33 percent from 2007 to 2011, Coral Springs, Florida in 2013). and in 2012, we were less than 1 percent below 2011. As one pub- As more consumers use broadband Internet connections and as the lisher said, “we re-structured the organization with greater customer average consumer uses more bandwidth for video, gaming, and a focus.” wide variety of activities and devices, we are seeing surging demand -- Innovation is difficult, yet worthwhile for Internet, and we have had to upgrade our networks to meet that Our fastest growth area for audiences and revenues is digital, and as demand -- as well as for high-definition video and other products we have all learned, it is hard work to innovate. and services. One of our general managers summed up the challenges of innova- We can literally track this phenomenon on our cable systems, and tion well: the growth of digital products and the development of new there is no question that this is impacting all of our companies. Our skills is a much longer curve than we are used to; the integration of a most critical assets are people and time, so I encourage you to think digital sales team is difficult internally and externally; a knowledge- about what each of us needs to do to meet our customers’ changing able sales manager is critical to growth of digital revenue stream; and needs. it is important to produce content for the unique attributes of each --You can build revenue in difficult times if you are systematic platform (i.e. mobile) and purposeful. We are experimenting and innovating while balancing the demands While cash flow is what we use to re-invest in the company, top- of our long-standing operations; we are growing the new while main- line revenue growth supports all of our day-to-day activities. taining the old. Prior to 2008, we use to assume revenue growth at each of our Another property managers summed it up nicely: “Our most companies. As a result of the experience of the “great recession” of important initiative is to increase revenue and share from existing 2008 and 2009, we no longer make that assumption; we all agree products and gain new revenue with new products and clients without that “hope is not a strategy”. The key discussion we have is not so jeopardizing our company, personal and product integrity.” much the revenue number as much as it is how it will be achieved. --Traditional media helped build our digital businesses through promotion, content creation, cross-selling and allocated revenue. Now, our digital businesses are helping our traditional media com- panies build new products and reach new clients. This final lesson learned is really the result of the last three. As we have innovated, focused more on customers, and used assets differ- ently in response to changing consumer behavior, we have seen sub- tle yet unmistakable shifts in our organization.