The Straight Story?
I'll withhold labeling them the Enron of journalism - for now. But this developing scandal will merit following:
Four advertisers are suing the Star Tribune, accusing the Minneapolis newspaper of inflating its circulation numbers by as much as 15 percent since 1999, and overcharging advertisers along the way.
According to the lawsuit filed Tuesday in U.S. District Court in Minneapolis, the Star Tribune Co. manipulated its paid circulation through a variety of schemes, including counting unsold newspapers that its distributors were instructed to dump at schools, nursing homes and hotels.
The lawsuit names both the Star Tribune Co. and its parent, the McClatchy Co., a Sacramento, Calif.-based newspaper firm with 29 newspapers around the country. The plaintiffs are staffing companies: Masterson Personnel Inc., Alternative Staffing Inc., Vision Staffing Solutions Inc. and Purchasing Professionals Inc.
Attorneys are seeking class status. Halunen estimated that "tens of thousands" of firms have been overcharged because of exaggerated circulation rates.
We've commented on the mystery that is the Star Tribune's claims of stable and even increasing circulation in the face of opposite industry trends and in context with the increasing alienation felt by moderate and conservative readers over the paper's radical and hostile editorial positions. I suppose the simplest explanation for this phenomenon would be that they're cooking the books. A tactic not unknown in the newspaper business.
We'll let the lawyers and courts hash this one out before passing judgment ourselves. But until we know the truth, I'll continue using a trusted advertising outlet, E-Bay, for all of my classified offerings.
UPDATE: Our circulation auditor, the Girl in Right, comments:
Your billions of readers are glad to see you're on the case of the Strib's inflated circulation numbers.
UDPATE 2: A copy of the compliant, located here.
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