Katharine Weymouth: New Washington Post Publisher On Her Plans For The Paper, Getting Mugged At Gunpoint, And Why The Business Numbers "Suck"

Seven years after the death of legendary Washington Post publisher Katharine Graham, her 42-year-old granddaughter has taken over control of the paper and is shaking up the newsroom. Katharine Weymouth tells Condé Nast Portfolio how she plans to save the family's flagship brand and--she hopes--reinvent the industry.

Nobody knows better than Katharine Weymouth that the newspaper industry is experiencing what may be called, euphemistically, a period of transition. But the new publisher of the Washington Post isn't big on euphemisms.

"The numbers suck in our business," the 42-year-old granddaughter of legendary Post publisher Katharine Graham declares, holding her tall, lithe frame dancer-straight, the result of a childhood spent in ballet classes.

It's a lovely day in early April, and Weymouth is at the Post's downtown D.C. headquarters, meeting with the staff of Style, one of the paper's more popular sections. The session is a stop on the listening tour of the newsroom that she's been conducting since February, when she was named publisher and chief executive of Washington Post Media, a newly configured unit that encompasses the newspaper's long-divided print and Web operations. (View a slideshow featuring some of the newspaper's major players.)

This should be a very good day at the Post. The day before, the paper won six Pulitzer Prizes, a record for the Post and the second-biggest haul ever for any newspaper in a single year. To celebrate, Weymouth threw open the doors of her decidedly unflashy home for an impromptu shindig, greeting coworkers in her bare feet and chatting with young staffers into the night.

But the afterglow is already waning, and now it's back to the dismal reality of newspapers everywhere. "We are going to have to get smaller and better and still find a way to put out the best product we can," Weymouth tells the assembled reporters and editors at the headquarters of the Post. "That may mean that we have to make some choices about what we can cover and what we can't--and those are going to be hard choices."

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Comments

[ROBOT8]

SHE IS SOOOOOOOOOOOHOT!

[nogimmicks]

Her challenge is start publishing real news at least slightly different to the rest of the commercial media.

[trollsbwild]

Where can I send my resume? She would be one hot boss!

[truth101]

Tree culture will not disappear but wane. No one reads
the ads in newspapers or google adverts either. The
fact that Google has been able to sell hyperspace
for a trillion dollars has to be the greatet hoax in history.
The Washington Post should hang in there.

[dadw5boys]

WHY WALMART THE PRESS???

GET SMALLER AND DO MORE?????

DETERMINE WHAT IS SELLING THEN SLOWLY CUT WHAT IS NOT AND EXPAND ON THAT!!

[darthdarcy]

Oh my God what a babe...!

[ICanHasDemocracy]

:wolf whistle:

can I look atcher back pages Mizz Weymouth...lol.

[wayoutleft]

on the other hand she could gross $200 million in another brenda starr remake. it's about time someone put journalism on the map.

[Beachrunner]

What a babe . . . Hey Kathi, can I be your office boy??

[ChiGuy]

Huh? What article?
I was too busy checking out the "Hot Babes of the Washington Post".

[JJeff88]

Sounds like she "gets it."

I think she's right about the economic drain printing tons and tons of newsprint each day has on a news gathering organization. In the end, the Internet may be the salvation of the industry. But there are other challenges:

- She should never forget that the "golden goose" is compelling and accurate editorial. Kill that goose and the ads will no longer "pull" (because folks who don't stay on each page long enough will skim past the ads) and her ad revenue will dry up.

-This means resisting the temptation to cut editorial staff or to provide more glitz at the expense of serious contents.

- Since deadlines and newsprint costs will become non-issues -"one-shot" articles can once again be advanced as often as needed.

- Once the Post goes 100% electronic, I hope Ms. Weymouth will realize that there will no longer need be a "morning edition" or an "afternoon edition" but one single ever-changing edition that people can tap into several times a day if they choose to. This in turn should make "meeting deadline" a less important priority than publishing stories when they're (a) meaningful and (b) "ready."

- And then there's the potential of multi-media - where podcasts from the Post's website could put it on equal footing with TV news (given TV's predilection for placing entertainment overnews) the Post could regain its former dominance over traditional electronic media as a credible news authority.

Exciting times.

[TroubleNYC]

She's quite fetching (from that pic).

[SeanGardner]

Very good article.

I lived in DC during many of my formative years, and remember the post, and Katherine Graham very well.

Much success to Ms. Weymouth as she ushers in a new era of success and reinvention at THE WASHINGTON POST.