Believe In America.com

butterbean · Joined: 21 Jun 2006 Posts: 2271

Last Wednesday afternoon, Donald E. Graham, the chief executive of the Washington Post Company, arrived in Manhattan for the Credit Suisse media week for analysts and told them, well, not much.

“For those of you who are seeing us for the first time, the shareholder audience and those of you who might become shareholders is who we are talking to,” he said, beginning with a friendly brush-back to Wall Street analysts that has become something of a tradition over the years. “We don’t do quarters; we don’t do forecasts,” he said.

Mr. Graham’s appearances have become cult classics in the investment community, which has learned to tolerate his lack of specificity with wan amusement. Most media executives are compelled to fan dance their way through presentations. Not Mr. Graham.

“He’s like a stripper who won’t take his clothes off and the audience still loves it,” said Jack Shafer, press critic for Slate, which is now owned by the Washington Post Company.

Peter Appert, a media analyst at Goldman Sachs, said Mr. Graham was able to get away with it for two reasons. “Operating results have been impressive and the ownership structure of the company means he can run it the way he wants to,” he said.

But this year when he says he has no idea what the future holds, there is every reason to believe him. The Post company’s stock may be doing better than most competitors, but its flagship publication is still subject to the irreversible changes taking place in how media are delivered.

The Washington Post newspaper is hurting, with advertising sales down 11 percent in the third quarter and circulation off 3.3 percent in the six months ended in September. Newsroom layoffs of an unspecified number are in the offing.

Mr. Graham said Wednesday that “2006 has been a poor year for every newspaper that I know of,” pointing out later that “during the summer, things changed drastically.

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http://www.nytimes.com/2006/12/11/business/media/11carr.html?ei=5090&en=220448990cd26170&ex=1323493200&partner=rssuserland&emc=rss&pagewanted=print