Verso NBHK Pulp Increase Announced

Verso Paper Corp. has announced a US $20 per ton increase on Nov 1st for (NBHK) pulp. The NBHK is at its mill in Quinnesec, Michigan, the company's coated freesheet facility.

 

Resolute's NBSK Pulp Price Increase

Resolute Forest Products is the latest pulp manufacturer to announce an increase in the NBSK pulp price in North America by $20 per ton, effective November 1.

Norske Skog Q3 Lower Debt, Good Cash Flow

http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/11/01/idUS52643+01-Nov-2012+HUG20121101

Gross operating earnings in the third quarter were NOK 365 million, compared to NOK 393 million in the previous quarter. The weak markets in Europe and Australasia were offset by lower variable- and fixed costs and effective production adjustments. Despite very challenging markets, we have been able to implement effective production adjustments, considerable cost reductions and a significant debt reduction this year, says President and CEO in Norske Skog, Sven Ombudstvedt. Cash flow from operating activities (before financial items) was NOK 550 million, an improvement of NOK 162 million from the same quarter last year. The good cash flow for the period was a result of an effective realisation of trade receivables and reduction of inventories.

Resolute Forest Issues 2011 Sustainability Report

Resolute Forest Products issues Sustainability Report for 2011 Performance:
Resolute Forest Products released its Sustainability Report for 2011 Performance today, detailing company efforts to balance environmental, social and economic considerations. The report also publicly introduces Resolute’s first company-wide sustainability strategy which has three primary areas of focus:
Reinforce Resolute’s environmental credentials, taking appropriate steps to responsibly manage its environmental footprint;
Position the company as a competitive employer, attracting and retaining employees based on opportunities to quickly learn and grow within a dynamic organization; and
Build solid community relations in Resolute’s operating locations, recognizing that economically viable and civically involved companies support long-term regional prosperity.

Flambeau Paper Financially Sound

http://www.pricecountydaily.com/news/article_d6e0ec5a-2390-11e2-a1a5-0019bb2963f4.html
While it is true that the Flambeau River Papers have missed making state loan repayments since March 2012, Senator Bob Jauch said it is important to temper recent news reports by looking at a broader picture of the situation. Jauch said in an interview on Monday, that he has been assured by the company that the Flambeau River Papers will be resuming the payments to the Wisconsin Economic Development Corporation in January. He was also assured that the company remains financially stable and plans to continue to sustain and grow its presence in the paper industry.  “It is important to note that the Flambeau River paper company has paid back 75 percent of the principal on one loan and 50% of the principal on the other two loans,” Jauch said. “Very clearly, the company is meeting its responsibilities.”

 

Incentives to Keep IP Headquarters In Memphis

http://www.commercialappeal.com/news/2012/oct/31/international-paper-seeks-incentives-to-expand/?partner=RSS 
Local officials plan to offer International Paper a package of incentives to keep the company's corporate headquarters and more than 2,000 jobs in Memphis. Three high-ranking city officials said they have been told by Mayor A C Wharton that Memphis is in a dogfight with Mississippi to keep the Fortune 500 corporation based here.The company, they said, is seeking a 30-year property tax break on a new building it would construct in Memphis.

In addition to retaining the company's current workforce, the project would bring another 100 high-paying jobs to the city, the officials said. The company recently acquired a competitor, Austin, Texas-based Temple-Inland.
 

RRD Puts Measures In Place After Google Filing

 http://www.chicagobusiness.com/article/20121101/NEWS01/121109997/r-r-donnelley-3q-profit-shrinks-cuts-forecast
Printing services provider RR Donnelley & Sons Co., which mistakenly filed Google Inc.'s earnings report ahead of schedule two weeks ago, said it has put measures in place to prevent any such incidents in the future.The company, whose third-quarter revenue fell more than expected, is the top agent for handling Securities and Exchange Commission filings and owns the EDGAR Online portal for SEC filings, used by corporations, analysts and investors.Chief Executive Thomas Quinlan, on a conference call with analysts, called the incident "deeply regrettable"."Everyone at RR Donnelley wishes it could have been undone. We have already begun to implement additional enhancements that will help to prevent an extremely rare incident like this one from happening again," he said.
Filing agents such as Donnelley take paper documents and convert them for submission to the SEC in the appropriate format. As of mid-October, the company had handled more than 75,000 submissions this year, according to SECInfo.com. RR Donnelley also lowered its full-year revenue forecast to $10.1 billion-$10.2 billion from $10.4 billion-$10.5 billion.

RRD Net Earnings Cut As Printing Sales Slump

RR Donnelley’s Net Earnings Cut in Half as Net Sales Slump : RR Donnelley’s Net Earnings Cut in Half as Printing Sales Slump:  R.R. Donnelley & Sons reported third-quarter 2012 net earnings of $71.4 million  on net sales of $2.5 billion, compared to net earnings of $158.0 million on net sales of $2.7 billion in the third quarter os 2011. "While our top line continues to be pressured by challenging industry dynamics and ongoing global economic headwinds, we remained focused on managing our cost structure to drive improved operating earnings and margins in the third quarter," said Thomas J. Quinlan III, RR Donnelley's president and CEO. "As we close the year and look ahead to 2013, our focus on aggressively aligning the cost structure with revenue will remain intact."  Net sales in the quarter were $2.5 billion, down $174.5 million, or 6.5 percent, from the third quarter of 2011. Pro forma for acquisitions, net sales decreased 6.9 percent due to volume declines, a 118 basis point unfavorable impact of changes in foreign exchange rates, price erosion and a 46 basis point unfavorable impact of lower pass-through paper sales.

Pivotal Research Lowers Ad Forecast, Citing Sandy

Pivotal Research lowers ad forecast, citing effects of Sandy:Media research company Pivotal Research Group lowered its U.S. ad forecast to a 0.5% decline in the third quarter, a 1.4% decline in the fourth quarter and zero growth for the full year, citing the effects of massive storm Sandy and other recent variables. The projections are down from an earlier forecast of 1.2% growth for the third quarter, 0.9% growth for the fourth quarter and 1.4% growth for the full year. The projections do not include political or Olympic ad spending.
“The first signs of a stormy second half of the year for advertising had become clear once the agency holding companies reported, and then Superstorm Sandy arrived, making us certain that 2012 will prove to be a year without growth for the U.S. advertising economy,” wrote Brian Wieser, senior research analyst at Pivotal Research Group, in the report. Wieser estimated Sandy will cost the advertising industry about $500 million in lost revenue, due to interruptions in local TV and radio programming and also factoring in decision-making by media buyers in the wake of the storm.

Capitalizing on Business Documents

Capitalizing on transactional documents: What happens when messages are sent within a printed business document? You may be surprised to know that they get read. This year the average consumer will see or hear more than one million marketing messages—that's almost 3,000 per day. But what happens when messages are sent within a printed business document? You may be surprised to know that they get read.
According to research from Pitney Bowes, printed bills garner more of the consumer's time than other channels, even when compared to the same content in electronic format. In other words, despite the advent of e-billing, most likely your utility bill or bank statement is read more often in print.

People Still Like To Read

http://www.economistgroup.com/leanback/mass-intelligence/people-like-to-read/
Last week, John Micklethwait, editor-in-chief of The Economist, spoke on NPR’s “The Diane Rehm Show”, along with Stephen Shepard, dean of the City University of New York (CUNY) Graduate School of Journalism and former senior editor at Newsweek and BusinessWeek. Given the recent announcement by Newsweek and the difficulties most print publishers are going through, both discussed the future of news magazines in this digital age. Here are some highlights from the interview:
 - The conventional thinking seems to be that in the age of the 24-hour news cycle, who needs a weekly news magazine? But why is Time successful and not Newsweek? What makes one magazine successful compared to another? “It’s that vague concept called editorial quality, by which I mean original stories that are not available elsewhere”, Shepard said. Publications that produce valuable content that readers are willing to pay for use the news for a forward-looking story that incorporates analytical thinking and is relevant not necessarily to what happened yesterday but to what the impact of yesterday’s news is.

 

Newspaper Inserts Drive Users Online

Newspaper Inserts Drive Users Online as Part of New Path to Purchase: Valassis, one of the nation’s leading media and marketing services companies, shared consumer insights from a recent survey conducted via social media that demonstrates favorable response to newspaper-delivered advertisements. According to findings from a 2012 Valassis survey, conducted on Facebook, 30 percent of respondents said they searched online for more information about a product or service within 30 days of seeing a newspaper insert. This consumer behavior further demonstrates how the traditional path to purchase has evolved and is no longer linear. The survey also revealed that of respondents who use newspaper inserts:
76 percent said inserts are one of the main reasons they purchase the newspaper;
92 percent say that inserts save them money; and
65 percent said inserts save them time.
Nearly 60 percent of insert users bought a product or service in response to seeing a newspaper insert, according to the survey. These findings indicate one of the ways traditional print and digital media work together to drive consumers from awareness to action.

Hearst UK and Polestar Agree To New Deal

Hearst Magazines UK and Polestar Agree to New Deal: Polestar is to retain our position as the Number One print supplier to Hearst Magazines UK. All twelve titles in the existing portfolio printed by Polestar are to be retained in a new three-year deal, which encompasses both print and subscription mailing. John Hughes, Production Director of Hearst Magazines UK, says: 'We are very pleased to continue our long standing relationship with Polestar. We trust them and know that they will support our publishing requirements into the future.'

Wenner Media Strikes Content Deal With Yahoo

Wenner Media Strikes Content Deal with Yahoo:
While digital content partnerships between publishers have been a common tactic for driving traffic and branding from one site to another, less common are dedicated pages shared between the two. Such is the deal that Yahoo and Wenner Media announced today, with Yahoo's omg! and Yahoo Music featuring mini-sites and blended content from Us Weekly and Rolling Stone. Likewise, UsMagazine.com and RollingStone.com will feature Yahoo-branded channels. Taking the syndication deal a step further, Us Weekly and Rolling Stone print magazines will also feature Yahoo content.
According to the partnership, the two companies will pool editorial resources to contribute content across the sites. Wenner's Men's Journal will also provide its content to Yahoo, making it the first time the brand has appeared on the network. The partnership gives Wenner a huge upside on scale. According to September comScore numbers, Usmagazine.com and Rollingstone.com attracted 6.7 million and 3.1 million uniques, respectively. omg! and Yahoo Music attracted 28 million.

Total Ave Circ Decrease For Newspapers, Some Gain

Total average circulation decreases for newspapers, but some titles post gains: The total average weekday circulation of U.S. newspapers fell 0.2% from April through September of this year compared with the same period in 2011, according to the Audit Bureau of Circulations. However, some newspapers posted circulation gains, notably The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal, each of which has a paywall on its website. Total average weekday circulation for The New York Times grew 40.3%, to 1.6 million. The Wall Street Journal saw a 9.6% gain, to 2.3 million.
Weekday circulation for USA Today, which recently unveiled a redesign for all its platforms, fell nearly 4%, to 1.7 million, while the Washington Post's average weekday circulation decreased nearly 9%, to 462,228.

Device Type, Demographics Affect Readership

http://www.emarketer.com/Article.aspx?R=1009453&ecid=a6506033675d47f881651943c21c5ed4
The print industry has looked to tablets as a potential savior of a suffering business. Whether digital ad revenues will make up for print losses remains to be seen, but millions of tablet users have taken to the devices to access periodicals on a regular basis.
More than a third of tablet users in the US read newspapers on their devices each month, and even more check out magazines, comScore found in August. Readership was a few percentage points above average for Kindle Fire owners, with iPad users coming in second place for both types of periodicals. NOOK and other Android tablet users were slightly less likely than average to read magazines and newspapers on their devices.

Australia Mags Tackle Bias Among Media Buyers

http://www.adnews.com.au/adnews/magazines-to-tackle-mystery-bias-among-media-buyers
Australia's big three magazine publishers are ramping up plans to tackle what they believe to be a baffling bias among media buyers against magazine advertising as part of a push from the recently revived Magazine Publishers of Australia. Underlying the new program is ad market comparisons for the UK and US markets which show Australia is dramatically less enamoured with magazine advertising than other key international markets. The common lament from magazine publishers is that media buyers do not value enough the fact that magazine readers pay for their content via cover prices.

Kimberly-Clark Divests and Closes Mills in Europe

Kimberly-Clark divests and closes mills in Europe
US tissue paper maker is withdrawing from its European disposable nappies business. According to a statement to Euwid, Kimberly-Clark reported that it was not able to establish a sustainably profitable nappies business in Europe. For this reason Kimberly-Clark has made the decision to close nappy production and sales in Europe and exit the diaper category. Only Italy remains exempt from this move. Five production facilities in Europe are affected by the decision; four of them part of the group’s Consumer division and one in the Professional segment. The changes will affect between 1,300 and 1,500 employees. The plants are located in the UK, Spain and Poland.

Swedish Media-Bonnier Invests In Newspapers

Swedish Media Group Bonnier Invests in KBA Commander CT: Official inauguration of KBA Commander CT at DNEX TryckerietAs well as intensifying its internet operations Bonnier, the globally prominent Swedish media group, has invested in printed newspapers with highly-automated Commander CT presses from Koenig & Bauer (KBA). The company's print arm, Bold Printing Group, has production plants in Akalla, a suburb of Kista near Stockholm, Malmö and Borås, and is one of the biggest print groups in Europe.