In an internal memo posted to B&C’s website, president and chief executive officer, Marshall Morton, told employees, “To thank you for your loyalty and dedication, we are going to reinvest some of the dollars generated by our strong performance this year back into our employees.”

According to the article, Media General will give employees a cash payment equal to up to five days pay.  In order to receive the full five days pay, employees had to have been furloughed for five days or more during 2011.  In June 2011, employees were mandated to take 15 unpaid days  before the end of the year.

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“Political revenues totaled nearly $20 million and reflected the strong positions of our television stations in their markets and the presence of six Media General stations in presidential battleground states,” president and CEO Marshall Morton said in a statement. “Our eight NBC stations generated a record $15.5 million of revenues from the Summer Olympics, capitalizing on record viewership for the London games.”

Media General also reported an +80% increase in cable and satellite retransmission fees and a +21% increase in advertising revenues for the stations’ websites in the third quarter.

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In a statement announcing the changes, J. Stewart Bryan III, the chairman of the Media General board, praised Morton for his leadership of the company during the financial crisis.

“Marshall joined Media General as chief financial officer in 1989,” Bryan said. “In his early years, we refocused Media General on its core strengths of local news, excellent journalism and southeastern markets.  As president, he guided Media General through unprecedented change in the media industry and a severe economic downturn.” continued…

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The company’s current structure of five geographic regions will be replaced by two geographic regions for its 18 television stations. Conschafter and Cottingham, who have both been named corporate vice presidents, will each oversee one region.

“With our June 25 sale of newspapers, Media General is focusing all of its resources on its broadcast television group,” Media General president and CEO Marshall Morton said in a statement. “We are delighted that our two most experienced broadcast executives will lead our television operations.” continued…

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The company today announced a deal with Berkshire Hathaway for the purchase of all of its newspapers, with the exception of its Tampa group, which includes The Tampa Tribune, for $142 million in cash.  Media General is currently in discussions with other prospective buyers about its Tampa print assets.

Under a separate agreement, Berkshire Hathaway will provide Media General with a $400 million term loan, which will be used to pay off bank debt, and a $45 million revolving line of credit. continued…

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Media General reported $3.2 million of operating income for the first quarter of 2012 compared with an operating loss of $4.2 million for the same period last year.  The company’s total revenue for the quarter was $150 million, up 0.4 percent from last year.

“The operating improvement is primarily the result of increased profits at our broadcast television stations, as they generated 12 percent revenue growth from increased political revenues and higher retransmission fees,” Media General president and CEO Marshall Morton said.

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The company, which owns 18 stations across the country including WFLA in Tampa and WJAR in Providence, announced that $70.35 million in broadcast revenue for the second quarter, down nearly 3% from the same period last year.

Media General blames the decrease in revenue on a decrease in political advertising. In a news release, president and CEO Marshall Morton pointed out that, if one excludes political advertising in both yeas, broadcast revenues actually increased 6.6%.

“Our television stations did an excellent job of replacing a large portion of last year’s Political revenues,” Morton said, adding that he expects stations to see a boost in political, as well as automotive, advertising during the second half of the year.

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“In order to reach our cash flow goal for the year, which has again been lowered from our initial expectations, we must cut expenses in the second half of the year,” writes Morton in a memo obtained by Poynter. “One of the fastest ways to flow expense savings to the bottom line, without broad-based permanent layoffs, is a furlough program – something we had hoped we would not need to do this year.”

Media General owns 18 TV stations, including Providence’s WJAR and Tampa’s WFLA, as well as 21 daily newspapers. Full memo inside… continued…

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Media General

In its earnings report, Media General pointed to the same factors that Gannett mentioned in its first quarter announcement earlier this week: the absence of the Olympics on NBC-affiliates and the Super Bowl on CBS-affiliates caused a dip in revenue compared to 2010.

“We were pleased that our Broadcast television stations continued their strong performance,” said Marshall Morton, Media General’s president in CEO, putting a positive spin on things. “Total Broadcast revenues decreased $1.8 million, or 2.6 percent, from last year, despite the absence of $7.6 million in Olympics revenues and nearly $1 million in Super Bowl revenues.”

The company also reported that its local media websites experienced a strong gain in revenue, pulling in 20% more than the previous year.

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