Ethnic Media Economics

The Spanish-language newspaper industry offers a fairly solid sense of the financial picture. The Latino Print Network collects the data, though much of it is self-reported and un-audited and therefore has not been substantiated. The information, however, is the only set of nationalized economic data.

Going by those figures, 2004 was another good year financially for Spanish-language newspapers. Despite declines in print circulation (see Audience), overall ad revenues were up for daily, weekly and less-than-weekly newspapers, climbing to $923 million from $854 million in 2003, an increase of 8%.2

Hispanic U.S. Newspaper Ad Revenue

Select years, 1970 - 2004

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Source: Kirk Whisler & Latino Print Network, Carlsbad, CA

The biggest growth came in the 317 weekly papers the Latino Print Network studies. Those went from $282 million in ad revenue in 2003 to $324 million in 2004.3 On the whole, that meant weekly papers accounted for 35% of all ad revenues among Spanish-language newspapers in 2004, up from 33% in 2003. But 42 daily Spanish-language newspapers still made up the bulk of ad revenues by far, 61% of the whole in 2004.4

Hispanic Newspaper Ad Revenues by Publication Category, 2003 vs. 2004

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Source: Kirk Whisler & Latino Print Network, Carlsbad, CA

Who is doing the advertising in Spanish-language newspapers? The figures from the Latino Print Network show that national ad dollars are a relatively modest source of revenue for daily and weekly newspapers. Local ads made up 82% of the total for Hispanic papers in 2004 (90% of which were published in Spanish), but 84% in 2003.5 But the differences between national and local are greater when the ad distribution is broken down by publication cycle.

National v. Local Ads in Hispanic Newspapers

2003 vs. 2004

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Source: Kirk Whisler & Latino Print Network, Carlsbad, CA

In 2004, a full 20% of the ads in daily Hispanic newspapers (96% of which published in Spanish) were national, according to the Latino Print Network and Kirk Whisler. The amount of national ads also grew in weeklies in 2004, from 16% to 17%. In less-than-weekly papers, the amount of national ad dollars actually declined, from 28% in 2003 to 14% in 2004, though the dollar amounts are so much smaller in those papers that a small change in cash equals a big change in percentage.6

Newspapers weren’t alone in having a successful 2004 in Spanish-language media. The Hispanic broadcaster Univision saw its net income rise by $100 million — or more than 60% — to $255.9 million.7 And the company announced that revenues and income were up again through the first nine months of 2005.

Univision Net Income, 2001-2004

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Source: Hoover’s Online

Figures for the other large Spanish-language broadcaster, Telemundo, are difficult to find. Telemundo, as a subsidiary of NBC and a part of GE, does not release it figures separately. Reports come in bits and pieces in GE documents. For instance, a second-quarter GE financial report noted that Telemundo had signed a deal with Wal-Mart TV to produce Spanish-language segments for in-store channels.