A reader says: "While the 100 or so operating committee members were being fired, where do you think eight of the corporate execs were? Check the corporate flight records, and see who was in Honolulu."My tipster has given me the eight executives' names, but we're both looking for further confirmation. Clever Gannett Blog readers know how to use online databases to track Gannett's Corporate jet. We'd all like to know how to do such searches. Would someone out there please check flight records for the period around Tuesday, Sept. 9, when the company laid off about 100 top managers?
Earlier: Our paper-by-paper tally of laid-off managers
[Photo: I don't have tail numbers for any current GCI aircraft. That's picture of Corporate's 1998 Dassault Falcon 2000, taken April 8, 2006]
Confidential to Corporate: You can run, but you can't hide -- from your increasingly networked employees.
ReplyDeleteDickey, Krans, Giallombardo, Bergin, Daughtery, Ray and 2 others were on their way to Honolulu! on the corporate jet non stop from Dulles. I'm sure it was catered with great food, snacks, drinks, bottles of wine, etc. Rough huh? And I wonder where they stay when on the island? I can bet you it wasn't at the Motel 6 at the airport!
ReplyDeleteSo disconnected from the real world!
I thought one of last year's reports said that they'd sold the jet along with a piece of property in McLean?
ReplyDeleteIf you all are waiting for digital revenue to be your savior, you need to think again.
ReplyDeleteWe will not see digital revenues come close to print revenues in our lifetime. Currently, digital is 10 percent of a newspaper's total ad revenue and print is 90%.
The print business requires the focus. There is plenty of value to be untapped there. As an industry, our websites are important for readers but the economics point to the premium print dollars.
Downsizing is necesary but we cannot allow print to go away completely.
There are so many innovative things Gannett could be doing besides slashing and burning.
hey folks: How much do you think 8 round trip tickets to Honon would have cost? How much time would have been lost in transit for those 8 execs?
ReplyDeleteAnd its not like this was a boondoggle - we do still own the paper in Hono and they could use some attention
I agree with 8:39. They were not using it for family vacations.
ReplyDeleteLike I have said in the past. Until the Advertising departments are run like Advertising Agencies they will fail. Ad Directors need to be replaced with Creative Directors and Sales Reps need to be replaced with Account Executives. A qualified Creative Director from outside the Newspaper industry could snap the Advertising departments into shape. Trust me when I say that unqualified people need not apply and will not be promoted.
ReplyDelete8:58 are you insane? Ad agencies are now being run by media people not creative people. why? because they understand how to harness the consumer connection and make money! Creatives bled ad agencies for 50 years and now creative shops are in dire straights. And creative people are still trying to sell 30 second TV spots while clients have moved on to the internet.
ReplyDeleteyou have no clue what you speak of. you are a dinosaur.
Really 8 top execs in Honolulu? Pla-Ease! And the timing could not have been worse. Traveling on a jet plane to the islands when everyone is getting fired? WTF?
ReplyDeleteWhy would a company with those kind of luxuries dare accept any kind of tax help (abatement, training grants) the way the Virginia-based company seemingly is doing at the Indy Service Center.
ReplyDelete7:55 am: Thanks! But why Honolulu?
ReplyDeletehono is taking it on the chin - the zoned weeklies are floundering, RE is in the toliet and they've chruned staff on the Ad team over the last year
ReplyDeleteI think the market study (market research study showing net audience) was also delviered during this meeting. These face-to-face meetings arent all that unusual on the mainland, although admittedly the timing stinks.
Anon 8:58 - Wow. Seriously wow.
ReplyDeleteClients dont come to NP for creative solutions - they come for audience delviery. You can dress it up anyway you want, but that's the business we're in. Thats why they hire agencies to delvelop creative - to use across multiple media. Under your model, clients would have to approve new creative for every paper? For every TV station?
It would be nice if our colleagues gave the Ad group the benefit of the doubt - we have lots of problems without turning on each other like a pack of dogs.
@8:39 AM -- Round-trip tix from Dulles to Honolulu can be had for about $675. Times 8 = $5,400, for about 24 hours of flight time.
ReplyDeleteNow that's for coach, 30 day advance, with a Saturday night stay.
How much for business class, few days advance, no Saturday stay? $2,349. Times 8 = $18,792.
Private jet big enough to carry 8 passengers costs at least $5,800 per hour. Times 24 = $139,200.
And now we know the real reason Honolulu was not included in the West Group during the recent restructuring.
ReplyDeletewhere did you get your running costs for your calculations. I do not believe that they are correct.
ReplyDeleteJim -
ReplyDeleteIt's usually simple to track the travels of planes through sites like fbo.com, etc.
That is, of course, unless the corporate overlords have taken specific action to prevent access to the information, as here on tail number N200GN: "This flight is blocked as requested by the owner."
Gannett did the same on Flight Aware.
"Information Centers." Ha.
Plane spotters who happen to snap photos of GCI planes and upload with time/date information might be the best way to keep track. And it's not a good way. Anyone have other tracking tricks?
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ReplyDeleteI just deleted a comment that was just too violent for my taste.
ReplyDelete