Regional newspaper chains owned by families or individuals play an increasing role in America's local-news landscape

Newspaper groups with 40 or more papers (Table from State of Local News 2022; for a larger version, click on it.)

At a time when much attention has been focused on large newspaper companies driven by venture capital, smaller groups of papers owned by families or individuals have gained a higher profile in the industry, often by buying local papers that the big chains no longer wanted.

That is documented by "The Rise of the Large Regional Newspaper Barons" by Greg Burns, the latest installment of the State of Local News 2022 report from the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University. "Six of the 10 largest newspaper owners in 2022 are regional chains – with between 50 and 142 papers apiece in their growing empires," Burns reports. "Three of those largest regional chains did not exist a decade ago, while the other three have been family-operated for generations." Burns says three companies "have led the way" since 2020:

• CherryRoad Media of New Jersey, a unit of CherryRoad Technologies formed in 2020, which owns 63 papers in 10 Midwestern states.
• Paxton Media Group, based in Paducah, Ky., which owns 115 newspapers in 10 Southern and Midwestern states and a TV station in its hometown.
• Ogden Newspapers, owned by the Nutting family of Wheeling, W.Va., which has 101 papers in 18 states from New Hampshire to Hawaii.

Ranking above those three, and just below the big chains, is Minnesota-based Adams Publishing Group, owned by Mark Adams, which grew quickly in the last decade but sold 16 papers in the last two years. "Among the regional media chains, several experienced considerable churn in their portfolios during the past two-plus years," Burns reports. "Paxton bought 55 papers, but also sold five and closed or merged 10. Ogden bought 28 and closed or merged 11."

CherryRoad or Paxton bought two-thirds of the 82 papers sold in the last two years by Gannett Co., the industry leader. Gannett has shed many papers it gained in the merger with GateHouse Media, which essentially took over Gannett and adopted its name.

Jeremy Gulban of CherryRoad "wants to use his dozens of newspapers to make a modest profit, build his company’s brand and find new customers for its technology services," Burns reports, quoting him: “It was a good time to get into this business. There were some good values to be had. We’ll definitely look to expand again into the fall. Everything has been going in the right direction, for now.”

Burns reports, "Gulban has added editorial staff where, in some cases, Gannett employed no one in the newspaper’s town," and is making less use of chains' typical principles of proximity, centralized functions and economies of scale: "It has acquired properties in different areas and makes no pretense of being a genuinely 'local' owner. Still, Gulban said, his approach is much more customized than that of Gannett."