Owner of T&G, others said to be in talks with USA Today owner
Photo | Grant Welker
The Telegram & Gazette offices on Front Street in Worcester
The media chain that owns the Worcester Telegram & Gazette, MetroWest Daily News and other daily newspapers in Massachusetts is reportedly in merger talks with the owner of USA Today and other major dailies.
The talks, as reported by The Wall Street Journal Thursday, would combine GateHouse Media and Gannett, the country's two largest newspaper chains at a time when the industry is seeing sharply declining revenues and circulation figures.
Gannett, the owner of USA Today and others, recently survived a proxy fight by Digital First Media, another major newspaper owner whose roster includes the Fitchburg Sentinel & Enterprise, Lowell Sun and Boston Herald. Digital First pushed to take over the company starting in January.
Gannett and GateHouse don't overlap in New England, despite their significant presence across the country.
Gannett owns only the Burlington Free Press in Vermont, while GateHouse owns daily newspapers in Worcester, Framingham, Milford, Quincy, Hyannis, Brockton, New Bedford, Fall River and Taunton, along with The Providence Journal and weeklies across much of the region.
Just last week, GateHouse instituted widespread layoffs that included six positions at the Telegram & Gazette and the reduction of staff at the weekly Worcester Magazine to just one reporter.
Both newspaper chains are publicly owned. GateHouse, which bought the Telegram & Gazette in 2014, is operated by the private-equity firm Fortress Investment Group LLC.
GateHouse has grown rapidly across the region in recent years, including the Providence Journal in 2014 and a group of Central Massachusetts newspapers in 2018, including the Gardner News, Worcester Magazine, the Holden Landmark, baystateparent magazine, the Grafton News, the Millbury-Sutton Chronicle and the Leominster Champion.
GateHouse has spent more than $1 billion on acquisitions since reorganizing out of a 2013 bankruptcy. As of March, the company publishes 156 daily newspapers and 464 other publications, and has a reach of 22 million people wach week.
Gannett says it has 109 media organizations in 34 states and a reach of 6 million readers every weekday.
Shares of both companies rose on the news on Thursday, but both remain far below their trading levels last year.
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