Good news and bad news for newspapers

With real estate taking a nose dive and the automotive industry not far behind, it's no wonder newspaper advertising numbers are down more than ever.

Reflections of a Newsosaur's post on the effects of car dealerships' closings on local advertising rings eerily true with my own newspaper.

When I started at the Gazette about a month ago, there were grumblings from all the reps about being gold against such big numbers from last year's sales. But the one who grumbled the least was actually the one who'd lost the most.

This rep had been in control of all real estate advertising in addition to her local territory. When I looked at the sales sheet, I couldn't believe my eyes. She sold tens of thousands of dollars in real estate each month last year. Now, she's pulling around $1,000, or $2,000 in a good month. That means she won't be making her goals for at least a year and maybe more if real estate keeps falling. And you won't ever hear her complain about it.

Not to mention that that's hundreds of thousands of dollars lost to the newspaper itself. And if automotive dealers go the way of real estate, then we're in big trouble.

But the good news for newspapers, according to Reflections of a Newsosaur, is that broadcast news is set to take a bigger hit in automotive advertising losses than print news.

Think about all of the car dealership ads that you see on TV. Hometown ads with all kinds of graphics and children and little jingles. Most of those could disappear, and without the campaign ads that flooded TVs last year and lined the broadcast industry's pockets, broadcast news is in for a big hit this year.

While that's good news for newspapers, I'm a firm believer that we're all in this together. If it's a hit to broadcast news, it's a hit to the journalism industry itself. And whether we're newspapers, radio, broadcast or online, that means we're all going to have to work a little bit harder to make things work.