Maine Weeklies For Sale

by Al Diamon

According to a story posted on the Wall Street Journal website early on April 3, the Dow Jones Local Media Group is for sale. The group, which is owned by Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp., includes the York County Coast Star, the York Weekly and the daily Portsmouth Herald, which serves southern York County, as well as their websites. The company also owns other daily and weekly papers in New Hampshire, Massachusetts, New York, Pennsylvania, Oregon and California.

News Corp. acquired the DJLM in 2007 as part of its purchase of Dow Jones & Co. It immediately tried to sell off the smaller operations, but had no serious offers and took the company off the market in 2008.

This time around, the market is expected to be better. The Journal story cites newspaper analysts who say the package might be attractive to Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway, which has recently been buying up local newspapers. Another possibility is Halifax Media Group, which bought the New York Times Co.’s regional newspapers last year.

Dow Jones officials said there was no timetable for completing a deal.

Al Diamon can be emailed at aldiamon@herniahill.net.