The McClatchy Company (MNI) is the third largest newspaper company in the U.S. based on daily circulation ^[1]. The company runs 31 daily newspapers and approximately 50 non-dailies across 29 markets nationwide ^[2]. In June of 2006, McClatchy acquired Knight-Ridder, Inc., the second largest newspaper publisher in the U.S.^[3] McClatchy's primary daily newspapers include The Miami Herald, The Sacramento Bee, the (Fort Worth) Star Telegram, The Kansas City Star, the Charlotte Observer, and The (Raleigh) News & Observer^[4]. In 2006, the company had an average paid daily circulation of 2,842,452 and Sunday circulation of 3,523,177 ^[5].

Throughout the last decade, internet advertising has continued to steal advertising dollars from traditional advertising^[6]. Newspaper publishers like MNI have been particularly affected, as advertisers have chosen to take advantage of the cheaper prices and greater measurability offered by online advertising. In an effort to offset its declining print advertising revenues, McClatchy has acquired various online assets including Real Cities, the nation’s largest advertising network of local news websites; and 15% of CareerBuilder LLC, the country’s largest online job site^[7]. The company also owns 25% of Classified Ventures LLC, a newspaper industry partnership offering classified websites like cars.com and apartments.com^[8]. Online advertising has become one of the fastest growing sources of revenue for the company, (increasing by 291% in 2006 from $35 million to $102 million), but was still only 6.1% of total revenues in 2006^[9].

(Read more at Wikinvest )