The Athletic Financial Woes

[Sousy]

I’m a subscriber and really enjoy what seems to be the last bastion of good daily professional sportswriting. This, however, does not seem great.

 

[Brock Beauchamp]

I’ve worried about this since The Athletic launched. They pay so much talent and offer so much for very little money, frankly. We’re exploring memberships here at TD and The Athletic’s monthly price makes me cringe because it’s so low.

I really hope they figure it out because they’re pretty much the best thing going in sports, imo. 

[Mike Sixel]

3 hours ago, Brock Beauchamp said:

I’ve worried about this since The Athletic launched. They pay so much talent and offer so much for very little money, frankly. We’re exploring memberships here at TD and The Athletic’s monthly price makes me cringe because it’s so low.

I really hope they figure it out because they’re pretty much the best thing going in sports, imo. 

Agreed. Too much talent for too little revenue. 

[Sousy]

11 hours ago, Mike Sixel said:

Agreed. Too much talent for too little revenue. 

Right - there's not many media markets any longer where the sports section is the driver of subscribers / revenue that it used to be.  The Athletic is a case where the writing is the subscription model, but it's apparently not enough to offset what the old newspaper model would make with advertising and classified listings.

The Athletic has been unique in trying to sell directly what we all used to pay newspapers for.  In my local (admittedly smaller) media market it's obvious that the revenues of the newspapers is nowhere near enough to keep an active group of writers working, much less travel / incidental pay to have a beat writer actually follow the team.  Most local sportswriting has just turned into regurgitating whatever the Twitter argument of the day is for the shrinking revenue base that subscribes to the paper.

[TheLeviathan]

I think the Athletic was a bold, fun idea.....I was never confident it would make it.  That's not how people digest media anymore, no matter how high the quality is.

[Vanimal46]

Not great, Bob. I’ve been a subscriber and supporter of the platform since it launched. But clearly they stretched themselves too far hiring talent and not recruiting enough subscribers. 

[Brock Beauchamp]

On 10/7/2021 at 1:30 PM, Vanimal46 said:

So they're burning through cash at almost a 150% rate over their total revenue. That's awful.

[Richie the Rally Goat]

There has been chatter of regulation changes, including 230 CDA, consumer data/privacy protection, antitrust against FB/Google/Apple etc… The implications are broad, but the Congress and Judiciary clearly don’t have real interest or substantial changes would be in the works or done by now.

But… If you think of a world where FB wasn’t 90% of consumers’ sole source of news, does the calculus change for The Athletic?

[Richie the Rally Goat]

On 10/10/2021 at 10:46 AM, Brock Beauchamp said:

So they're burning through cash at almost a 150% rate over their total revenue. That's awful.

The Athletic is trying to become a monopsony no? If you are a sports writer, how many other places are there to go? Is the long game to become outsourced sports department for other publications, like Reuters/AP?

[Mike Sixel]

6 hours ago, Sconnie said:

There has been chatter of regulation changes, including 230 CDA, consumer data/privacy protection, antitrust against FB/Google/Apple etc… The implications are broad, but the Congress and Judiciary clearly don’t have real interest or substantial changes would be in the works or done by now.

But… If you think of a world where FB wasn’t 90% of consumers’ sole source of news, does the calculus change for The Athletic?

I'm not sure how any journalism can survive w/o political backing (see certain cable propaganda channels) at this point.

[Vanimal46]

 

[Brock Beauchamp]

I hope it works out for everyone involved. The Athletic is a fantastic service.

[Squirrel]

5 minutes ago, Brock Beauchamp said:

I hope it works out for everyone involved. The Athletic is a fantastic service.

What are the chances the Times keeps it as is?

[Mike Sixel]

4 hours ago, Squirrel said:

What are the chances the Times keeps it as is?

Zero

[TheLeviathan]

1 hour ago, Mike Sixel said:

Zero

Right, it's bleeding money because it was an unsustainable model.  You don't sink 550M into a money pit.

[Brock Beauchamp]

12 hours ago, Mike Sixel said:

Zero

Yep. No one buys a floundering business that is bleeding money and keeps everything as-is. At this point, I just hope The Athletic can maintain most of what it is right now and stay afloat.

[ashbury]

17 hours ago, Squirrel said:

What are the chances the Times keeps it as is?

Literally the same, no, as others have said.  I want to strike a more optimistic note and say that the Times seems like a good home for it and probably they will not fundamentally alter the basic journalistic independence of the contributors.  I wouldn't feel that way if it had been acquired by, well, just about anyone else.  Hopefully the Times sees synergies they can provide, and minimally adjust parts of the business model that consume too many resources for the revenue that is brought in.

[Squirrel]

1 minute ago, ashbury said:

Literally the same, no, as others have said.  I want to strike a more optimistic note and say that the Times seems like a good home for it and probably they will not fundamentally alter the basic journalistic independence of the contributors.  I wouldn't feel that way if it had been acquired by, well, just about anyone else.  Hopefully the Times sees synergies they can provide, and minimally adjust parts of the business model that consume too many resources for the revenue that is brought in.

It was honestly a rhetorical question because I believe it to be zero as well

[ashbury]

5 minutes ago, Squirrel said:

It was honestly a rhetorical question because I believe it to be zero as well

Well, things were bound to change had the acquisition not occurred.  Change is the one constant in much of life.

[Vanimal46]

Still not doing well… How much more runway do they have before they close their doors? 

[Mike Sixel]

11 minutes ago, Vanimal46 said:

Still not doing well… How much more runway do they have before they close their doors? 

I bet they shutter / sell this year. At the outside, next year. Too bad, they have great talents (but, I no longer sub....I just didn't read the stuff most days).

[Vanimal46]

15 minutes ago, Mike Sixel said:

I bet they shutter / sell this year. At the outside, next year. Too bad, they have great talents (but, I no longer sub....I just didn't read the stuff most days).

That was my issue as well. There are several writers I like and want to support, but it didn’t become a habit for me to go read their content. Towards the end of my initial subscription I also noticed the comment section trending towards Facebook quality. 

[Mike Sixel]

2 minutes ago, Vanimal46 said:

That was my issue as well. There are several writers I like and want to support, but it didn’t become a habit for me to go read their content. Towards the end of my initial subscription I also noticed the comment section trending towards Facebook quality. 

Right. Eno and Keith for sure......I really like reading their work. But, even then, I never felt compelled to read. That has more to do with my decreasing interest in sports, though. 

[Musk21]

There's a ton of writers to like/support including:

MLB/Twins - Gleeman, Rosenthal, Hayes, Keith Law

NBA/Wolves - Krawczynski, Shams, Zach Harper, David Aldridge, Sam Amick

NFL/Vikings - Chad Graff

NHL/Wild - Michael Russo

 

Just can't be sustainable much longer....