I’ve lived in my current apartment for almost nine months, but it was only last night that I made it to my first neighborhood association meeting.

It turns out one of my neighbors is none other than Maurice Jones, publisher of the Virginian-Pilot.

Small world, eh?

Not everyone in my neighborhood has that haircut...

Jones spoke candidly and took questions for about 45 minutes in front of the Freemason Street Area Association. I had met Jones briefly before at a high school journalism conference, but I had never heard him speak before. My gut reaction: The Pilot is in the hands of a man who is sharp, confident, and honest with himself enough to acknowledge that newspapers can no longer stand on their own, but need to be supported by auxiliary businesses.

He’s also charming, quick with a joke, and diffused the audience’s more aggressive questions with a particular aplomb. I could be very wrong–I’m still relatively new around here–but this region seems lucky to have him as our paper’s publisher.

Following are some of the more interesting things Jones said at the meeting last night. [Warning: this is an unabashed notebook dump.] Let me start with some caveats: this was not a press conference, but a casual neighborhood meeting, so I wouldn’t hold Jones to exact numbers. And even though when I asked a question Jones knew who I was, there’s a chance he didn’t realize a reporter was there before that. Does this matter? Probably not, but I’m telling you anyway.

What’s written is a quote from Jones; what’s in parentheses are my notes/clarifications.

Health of The Pilot

The newspaper business is going through a transformation. The Pilot is healthy. We’re in a very good place.

Subscribers are 15-20% of a typical newspaper’s revenue. One of the challenges we’ve had to confront is what happens when 80% hits recession? You’ve got to cut back on your expenses.

(According to Jones, during his tenure, they’ve went from 1,300 to 1,000 jobs.)

Alternate revenue sources // Business models

Jones (Photo | hamptonroads.com)

We’ve got Pilot Direct: You would call it junk mail. We have the ability to direct mail to your home.

We deliver other newspapers’ papers to your home.

When I got here, we hadn’t raised subscription prices since 1999. I know no other business that can keep prices stable for seven years.

The theory is, keep the prices low on papers, so you get a lot of readers, to keep the advertisers.

In the future, few papers will rely on subscribers.

We’re not a newspaper company. We’re a media company that needs to diversify.

The paper thrown on your porch will be the Daily James, or the Daily Admiral. We’ll give each one of us our own newspaper. I envision everybody getting the same core, the rest will be customized.

We’ve talked about having a different front page for delivery and newsstand, but I’m afraid of what we might get. Crime and entertainment are what pulls people in.

(On alternative revenue sources:) You’ll see stickers. Ads on the front page, ads inside of editorial. That pays the bills, and we’ve got to find a way to do that in a way that is tasteful and non-offensive to our readers. Competition is so intense. (If they don’t do things like this) we’ll lose the business, and if we lose the business we won’t be able to keep the paper.

Our niche business is 30% and growing. Everything but the paper amounts to 40% of our business.When I got here in 2005, 93% of profit was in The Pilot itself.

It’s like the Cleveland Cavaliers. When Lebron has a bad game, do you have a supporting cast that’s as talented so you won’t lose?

Online // Readership // Reader habits

Every Sunday, 500,000 people read The Pilot. The biggest day of the year for TV is the Super Bowl. There are fewer people who watch the Super Bowl in this market than read The Pilot on Sunday.

Not true that young folks don’t want to read print either.

What the web offers is to search for what you want, get what you want, and get out of there.

The web leads to a less informed citizenry.

We can track your every move online. We’re gonna have to figure out that information for the print edition as well.

Perception of their coverage

People have stopped talking to us. We’re only as good as our sources.

(On why other school districts have received less intense coverage than Norfolk:) My guess is we don’t have the same sources in other districts.

There’s no joy in this stuff, knowing it could be harmful to the region. Our job is to be brutally honest about the facts.

We consider ourselves the newspaper of record for South Hampton Roads. We’ll always favor local stories over national. But if The Pope dies, The Pope goes on the front page.

Advertisers

The biggest advertisers used to be employers looking for employees. Now, it is groceries, media, auto, and real estate.

Advertisers blame newspapers for everything. Everybody is stressed. I have more calls from advertisers saying they’re pulling out of the paper because of that editorial than ever before.

(When I asked if he feels increased pressure to blur the line between editorial and advertising, he said:) I get the pressure, more than ever, but I don’t feel it. I do get more calls.

The moment I look like I can be bought is the moment I lose you all.

Editor’s Note: In the original version of this story Jones was quoted as giving an absurdly wrong average readership time statistic. Upon receiving more accurate information from Pilot editors, the line has been deleted altogether.