Landmark Media Enterprises
| Type | Private |
|---|---|
| Genre | Media |
| Founded | 1905 |
| Founder(s) | Samuel L. Slover, Frank Batten |
| Headquarters | 150 Granby Street Norfolk, Virginia 23510-2075 |
| Key people |
Frank Batten Jr., Chairman and CEO Jack Ross, President and COO |
Landmark Media Enterprises LLC (formerly Landmark Communications) is a privately held media company headquartered in Norfolk, Virginia specializing in broadcast television, print publishing, internet publishing, software, and data centers.
Contents |
History [edit]
The company was founded in 1905 as Norfolk Newspapers, a holding company for the newspaper properties of Samuel L. Slover. They included papers which would eventually become today's Virginian-Pilot. Frank Batten took over the company in 1954, and changed its name to Landmark Communications in 1967. It became Landmark Media Enterprises in 2008. Landmark is controlled by the Batten family.
Properties [edit]
Landmark owns Dominion Enterprises, which runs web sites spanning a variety of subjects, including real estate, apartments, employment, boats, vehicles, heavy equipment, parenting, travel, franchises, and businesses for sale. Dominion also provides software as a service products to real estate agents, auto dealers and motorcycle dealers.
Landmark owns seven daily newspapers:
- The Virginian-Pilot, Norfolk, Virginia
- The Roanoke Times, Roanoke, Virginia
- The Annapolis Capital, Annapolis, Maryland[1]
- The Carroll County Times, Westminster, Maryland
- Citrus County Chronicle, Crystal River, Florida
- The News-Enterprise, Elizabethtown, Kentucky
- Los Alamos Monitor, Los Alamos, New Mexico
It also owns over 120 community and special-interest newspapers in sixteen states. This includes seven publications that cover college sports at Florida State University, University of Florida, Indiana University, University of Iowa, University of Nebraska, University of Kentucky, and University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
Landmark owns CBS affiliate KLAS-TV, Las Vegas, Nevada.
Landmark owns Continental Broadband, one of the leading providers of data center (colocation) and managed data network services in the United States. Its business units include Expedient and nFrame.
Former properties [edit]
Landmark's predecessor, Norfolk Newspapers, first entered broadcasting in 1930, when it bought Virginia's oldest radio station, WTAR. It later added Virginia's second television station (and Hampton Roads' first), WTAR-TV (now WTKR) and an FM station (now WVKL). It acquired WFMY-TV in Greensboro as part of its purchase of the Greensboro papers in 1965. However, FCC crossownership rules forced Landmark to sell off WFMY in 1976 and WTAR-TV in 1981. Under the rule, Landmark could not own both a newspaper and a television station in those markets. Landmark also used to own a minority share of the Washingtonian Magazine, until its rights were traded to Eleanor Merrill, widow of publisher Philip Merrill, in a trade for full ownership of the Annapolis Capital newspaper.[1]
In December, 2001, Landmark announced the closing of its wholly owned subsidiary, Church Impressions, LLC, based in Greenville, North Carolina, a publisher of church directories, portraits, and other print and web media products.
Landmark owned the hobby publisher Antique Trader Publications until its sale to Krause Publications in 1999.[2]
Landmark owned Chicago magazine until it was sold to Primedia in 1995. In addition, Landmark was a former owner of KNTV in San Jose, California (now an NBC owned-and-operated station, serving the San Francisco Bay Area media market).
During Landmark's twelve-year ownership of the station (which lasted from 1978 to 1990), KNTV (affiliated with ABC and serving the Monterey / Salinas media market at the time) was its only station that was not an affiliate of the CBS network. Landmark also briefly owned WDBJ-TV in Roanoke, but was forced to sell it immediately due to FCC Restrictions.
Landmark formerly owned four career training schools that focus on health-related career education:
- Glendale Career College
- Certified Careers Institute
- Nevada Career Institute
- Virginia Career Institute
On September 19, 2007, it was announced that Continental Broadband (CB), a Landmark Communications (Landmark Media Enterprises) company, sold its South Florida business unit, WebUnited, to Host.net, the leading provider of data center (colocation) and managed network services in Florida.[3]
On May 15, 2009, it was announced that CB sold its Chicago business unit, ANET, to Cogent Communications, a global Internet service provider. On January 23, 2010, it was announced that CB sold its Richmond Business Unit, NET Telcos, to Cavalier Telephone, a full-service provider of telecommunications solutions.
On January 3, 2008, it was reported that the entire Landmark Communications company may be for sale.[4]
Landmark's best-known media outlet was The Weather Channel based in Atlanta, Georgia. In early 2008 Landmark Communications announced it was exploring the option to sell all its holdings. Two separate investment banks, JPMorgan Chase and Lehman Brothers, were hired to help with the sale of The Weather Channel and the newspapers.
In July 2008, the company announced the $3.5 Billion sale of The Weather Channel properties, including its share of The Weather Network and MétéoMédia, to NBCUniversal, and the private equity firms Blackstone Group and Bain Capital. Landmark and NBC Universal completed the sale on September 12, 2008.[5] Additionally, on July 14, it was announced that WTVF in Nashville, Tennessee would be sold to Bonten Media Group;[6] that sale did not close.
In October 2008, the company announced that it was suspending the sale of most of its properties, citing the ongoing credit crisis, with the exception of The Virginian-Pilot newspaper.[7]
In addition to The Weather Channel, Landmark sold the following weather properties:
Until 2008, Landmark was part-owner (with Pelmorex) of Canadian weather channels The Weather Network and MétéoMédia. A second cable outlet, The Travel Channel was owned by the company from 1992 to 1996, when it was sold to Paxson Communications, who subsequently sold it to Discovery Communications, who subsequently sold it to Cox Communications.
In September 2012, Landmark announced the sale of WTVF-TV, Nashville, Tennessee to Journal Communications. The sale closed in December.[8][9]
Landmark sold the News & Record in Greensboro, North Carolina to Berkshire Hathaway on Jan. 31, 2013.
Financial News [edit]
Landmark announced that it was going to terminate its pension fund, which covered some of its retirees and current employees. The plan was fully funded. The pension beneficiaries were able to choose between a lump-sum distribution or an annuity provided by an insurance company.
See also [edit]
References [edit]
- ^ a b Ahrens, Frank (2007-04-26). "Annapolis Newspaper Swapped for Washingtonian". The Washington Post. Retrieved 2010-05-07.
- ^ Antique Trader - About Us
- ^ Continental Broadband Continues Pursuit Of Its Business Plan With Strategic Move in South Florida Market
- ^ Choyke, Bill; Walzer, Phil (2008-01-03). "Battens may sell The Roanoke Times' parent company". The Roanoke Times. Retrieved 2008-01-03.
- ^ Sutel, Seth (2008-07-06). "NBC Universal to buy The Weather Channel for $3.5B". Associated Press. Archived from the original on 2008-07-20. Retrieved 2008-07-08.
- ^ "Bonten Buys WTVF-TV Nashville from Landmark". Broadcasting & Cable. 2008-07-14. Retrieved 2008-07-14.
- ^ "Landmark suspends sale of assets, but not the Pilot". Virginian Pilot. 2008-08-30. Retrieved 2008-11-27.
- ^ "Journal Communications to Purchase NewsChannel 5, WTVF TV, Nashville, Tennessee from Landmark Media" (Press release). Journal Communications. 2012-09-04. Retrieved 2012-09-04.
- ^ "Journal Communications to Acquire Landmark's WTVF NewsChannel5". Broadcasting & Cable. 2012-09-04. Retrieved 2012-09-04.
External links [edit]
- Who Owns What: Landmark Communications, from the Columbia Journalism Review
- LCNI buys Pageland paper, a June 2005 article about Landmark's purchase of the Pageland Progressive-Journal
- Continental Broadband Newsroom
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