Media General, Inc. profile and media properties

Dolly Wilson    Hickory, North Carolina

Posted at 5:26am on Monday, May 31, 2010

I find it appalling that I have been a customer of Hickory Daily Record and the NewsHerald for over 30 years and for the last 3 days have not received a newspaper due to a broken contract and slack in documentation on the part of the manager of this paper. On November 7, 2009 I called to cancel my paper. I was told I could get the paper for 50% off for a year if I continued my subscription. I continued to receive bills. I called 6 times to remind them of their promise and was told "someone" would call me back. I never received a call so continued to spend precious time calling again. I finally received assurance from Mike the manager that I would get my paper for this agreed upon time and price. I called yesterday and received an obnoxious remark by Anthony (when I said I only received one phone call during work hours on Friday so could not get anyone after 5). He stated "how many phone calls would you like Miss Wilson?" I spoke to Franscheska about this and she assured me someone would call me yesterday. Today, no paper, no phone call. I feel very disrespected and disappointed and hope Mike and Anthony review customer service policy and the importance of keeping your word.

Barry Reichard    Homosassa, FL, USA

Posted at 7:50am on Sunday, March 21, 2010

My comment is relative to Tampa's Channel 8 TV.

Barry Reichard    Homosassa, FL, USA

Posted at 7:48am on Sunday, March 21, 2010

On the very eve of a very close and critical vote on the most important legislation in our country's recent history, your evening news coverage of the historical health care reform actions ended by airing a statement from a man on the street!!!

He essentially said, "You either buy your own or have big government control."

Nothing was reported about his credentials, but he sounded like a Tea Party radical repeating the misleading Republican mantra at worse, and at best really did not know what was in the legislation.

He obviously does not know what the government already does to help provide or protect his healthcare, and I guess the only way he ever will is if all that government support is taken away. The news media rarely if ever tells about all the good things our governments do for us. But I'll bet this guy will be the first to bitch if something goes wrong or if we truly let big business conduct their business without any government controls. This recession is pretty good evidence of where the lack of sufficient controls on greedy big businesses will lead us.

And I wonder what this guy would say if he lost his job and health care insurance and encountered a catastrophic health problem?

Are your news people really this biased or bent on reporting only what they perhaps think is popular? Do they not have the resources to learn about and report on the facts?

Perhaps worse than the end of this coverage was the fact that the report was extremely uninformative and primarily showed Tea Party protesters and the Republican leader talking about Armageddon.

No facts about of the legislation were reported, not even negative facts.

Does this kind of reporting satisfy your mission statement?

Is it your mission to report only the popular? To stir up more radicalism? To provide free campaign advertisements to the Republicans?

My family has watched your evening news since we moved here fifteen years ago.

Last night was probably the end of that. I think you just lost our viewer ship!!!

Media Owners editors    Boulder, Colorado USA

Posted at 10:40pm on Saturday, January 30, 2010

Media General Reports Fourth-Quarter 2009 Results

RICHMOND, Virginia, January 28, 2010 – Media General, Inc. (NYSE: MEG) today reported net income for the fourth quarter of 2009 of $27.4 million, or $1.18 per diluted share, compared with a net loss of $85.5 million, or $3.86 per diluted share, in the 2008 fourth quarter. Income from continuing operations before income taxes, and adjusted for severance and impairment in both years, increased 40 percent to $22.9 million, compared with $16.4 million in the 2008 fourth quarter.

“Media General’s fourth-quarter results improved year-over-year and sequentially from the third quarter of 2009. Total revenues in the fourth quarter decreased 14 percent, a sequential improvement from an 18 percent decrease in the third quarter of 2009. In addition, the 2009 quarter included only $3.7 million of Political revenues, compared with $23.4 million in the 2008 fourth quarter. Advertising sales strengthened as the quarter unfolded. In the month of December, total revenues were essentially even with December 2008,” said Marshall N. Morton, president and chief executive officer.

Frank Littleton    Graceville, Florida

Posted at 9:53am on Saturday, September 12, 2009

Jerry Tramel. How many are their? This article must be hurting all of them, named Jerry Tramel.What is funny is this is Media Genrals Web and it doesn't even move the article. The crawlers are surely blocked. What he wrote is correct. I tried moving the article about him and it does not budge! That is very wrong. I believe that is called defamation of character. Someone with Media General and The Floridan should look at this.
Besides, the man committed No Crimes. No Court. All charges were Dismissed! This is absurd.
I agree all articles about Jerry Tramel should be retracted.

John Reitz    Panama City, Florida

Posted at 6:27pm on Friday, September 11, 2009

After reading the article on Jerry Tramel and then finding out the man was not even convicted of anything, that is overboard!! The Jackson County Floridan should run a retraction of all their articles concerning Jerry Tramel. This newspaper should really know its' liabilties!
Be realistic, the mans credentials are real! Ruled on by the Circuit Judge and agreed on by the State Attorneys Office! Except the fact, he's real!
I also checked the article in question and yes someone has locked the crawlers from this article which will exempt it from being read by Crawlers and never moved.
Hey, Mr.Tramel Bay County has a lot of good Attorneys!!

Jerry Tramel    Marianna, Fl. USA

Posted at 9:32am on Tuesday, September 1, 2009

I believe that Media General is doing a very wrongful thing! They posted an article on Jerry Tramel with Google and locked the article, so it could never be moved if other articles were viewed more. In other words, when an article is not viewed it is moved down the list. They locked this one to stay at the top!I checked with Limelight, the Google assistant webmaster.
But, what is bad is they never did a retraction of this article. I was not convicted of a crime, in fact the charges were completely dismissed and should not have been made! They know this at The Jackson County Floridan Newspaper. I notified Media General on several occasions and did not get a response.
Maybe they committed a crime?

Katie Dahlberg    Mansfield, Ohio Richland

Posted at 7:25am on Monday, January 12, 2009

I've watched WCMH channel 4 in Columbus all my life and it's really only the channel I watch for news because it has the best coverage of everything that I want to know about. Time Warner recently decided to eliminate it from our cable network. Can you help us get it back? I am not alone in wanting this channel back on our cable. We live a 55 minute drive from Columbus and an hour and a half from Cleveland. I have no interest in Cleveland's news. I never go there and so would never spend my money there. We are in Columbus at least once a week and need to know what's going on there. Please say that you can help us get our beloved WCMH back!

Kimberly    Tampa, FL

Posted at 6:03pm on Wednesday, October 22, 2008

We have been a loyal subscriber to The Tampa Tribune for over six years. I am extremely disappointed and dissatisfied with the customer service that I have recently received.

I received a bill for $83.46 in August. Usually someone calls me to ask me if I want to renew, but no one called. I called on September 30th at 2pm and spoke with Jean. I told her I paid $55.08 last year and asked if she could give me a better rate than the $83.46 on the bill. Jean was extremely rude and told me she could do it this year for $59.53 but not to expect a rate like that again. I told her if she wanted to be like that, I'd consider switching to The St. Pete Times. I told her I'd call back another time and hung up.

I called back at 2:10 pm and spoke with Ed. I told him what had happened and that I didn't want to talk to Jean anymore because she was rude. I told him I'd like to renew under the $59.53 rate that Jean gave me. He then told me that Jean had cancelled my subscription and that my paper would start again in a few days. I was furious at this point. I never asked her to cancel my subscription. He told me he restarted my subscription and everything was all set. I assumed he used my credit card information on file since he never asked me for my credit card number. I asked to speak to a supervisor about not getting a paper for a few days.

The supervisor came on the phone after a long hold and assured me I would get a paper tomorrow. He apologized and told me that he would speak with Jean. By the way, it was very hard to understand Jean, Ed and the supervisor. They all had an accent (Indian? perhaps). It was very frustrating.

Everything was fine. Someone even called me the next day and asked me about renewing. I told him I just did the day before. He said okay and that was all I heard until Monday, October 20th. We did not receive a paper that morning. I called and they brought a paper a little after 9am. We received our paper on Tuesday, October 21st. We did not receive our paper this morning, Wednesday October 22nd. I called the automated service and it transferred me to someone (I forget his name, but he had an Indian accent again). He told me our paper stopped because we didn't renew our subscription. I was pretty irate at this point. I told him everything that happened on September 30th. He said he saw it in the computer. I told him I was so mad I was just going to switch to The St. Pete Times. He asked me if there was anything else he could help me with today. Help me with? Maybe a little courtesy from The Tampa Tribune staff. I asked him where he was located and he wouldn't tell me. I'm assuming you are outsourcing your calls to India. Well, you are going to lose a lot of customers with service like that!

We were already very frustrated with The Tampa Tribune's changes lately. The Sports Section and the Business Section combination is ridiculous! I usually read the Business section at breakfast while my husband reads the Sports Section. That is not possible anymore.

We are so upset and plan on telling everyone about it!

It is just so upsetting because no one from The Tampa Tribune cares.

Cranberry Jeffreies    Bristol

Posted at 7:19am on Wednesday, August 8, 2007

I have been a customer of this newspaper for over 40 years. Today I was hung up on for complaining about my service. I have changed my subscription to weekends, and if things don't improve, will discontinue totally.
It is totally disrespectful to tell a customer who is trying to change a subscription, "Thank You, bye bye" and hang up in their ear! No matter how busy one is, the customer deserves some amount of courtesy. Maybe if you improve the quality of your customer service reps your circulation would improve!