Media Frenzy

By Rob Holbert Managing Editor

WKRG reporter Kesshia Peyton will be taking a new role behind the morning anchor’s desk starting Jan. 7, joining meteorologist and feature reporter Jere Hough for an hour each morning from 9 a.m. to 10 a.m.

Current morning anchors Bill Riales and Jennifer Abney will start their morning show at 5 a.m. beginning that day, as well, and will stay on the air until 9 a.m.

Peyton has been with KRG since 2004 as a general assignment reporter and began her career as a producer at WLTX in Columbia, S.C. She has also worked at television stations in Ohio, Florida and Alabama.

Peyton is a graduate of the University of South Carolina and has a master’s degree in Journalism from the University of West Florida.

Hough has been with WKRG since 1988 when he did weather for the morning show and was the environmental reporter. He has a bachelor’s and master’s degree from the University of Wisconsin in Madison. He later earned a Bachelor of Science degree from Mississippi State University.

Circulation changes

Circulation continues to be poor for newspapers across the country, as many of the nation’s largest dailies continue to see a bleeding of their readership to other mediums such as the Internet and television.

Circulation information for the Press-Register seems to suggest the local daily is seeing some attrition when it comes to circulation, although not the kind of losses some of the big boys are seeing, which appears to be about 2 percent this year according to media reports.

According to the Audit Bureau of Circulations, the industry leader in tracking circulation, the Press-Register’s report for the six months ending Sept. 30, 2007, pinned the average circulation Mon.-Fri. at 95,015, Saturday at 88,968 and Sunday at 110,636.

Sunday circulation in October of 2006 was 111,368, so the decline has only been about .6 percent from fall to fall. And the P-R also saw a similar decrease in Mon.-Fri. circulation according to the ABC, going from 95,699 last October, a loss of about .7 percent.

This past spring’s Monday-Friday numbers were actually good news for the P-R, as the ABC audit that ended in March 2007, pegged circulation for weekdays at 99,742, up from the previous March’s 94,680, a healthy 5 percent increase. But Sunday circulation from that same period did not do likewise, falling from 117,279 in March 2006 to 114,247 in March 2007, according to ABC numbers. That’s a 2.5 percent decrease.

Overall, the P-R seems to be holding up pretty well against the national trend of circulation decline. Of course, the Mobile area has continued a good growth trend, which could be helping that.

Douglas at WALA

April Douglas recently joined FOX 10’s news team as a reporter. A Mobile native, Douglas received a B.S. from the University of Montevallo. Prior to WALA, Douglas worked at WMBB in Panama City, Fla. where she was a reporter. From there she spent five years with WCTV in Tallahassee where she started as a reporter and moved to weekend anchor.

Douglas is also a Murphy High School graduate.

Dining guide out

Astute readers probably noticed Lagniappe’s ads over the past couple of months for a Dining and Entertainment Guide we’d hoped to publish in this issue. Unfortunately, it seems many of our local restaurants are feeling an economic pinch these days and weren’t ready to put out the bread for something like that.

We’ll see how things look in the next few months, because we still think many of our readers would like to have something handy they can keep to help them make dining and entertainment decisions before leaving the house.

In the meantime, please don’t forget to support your local restaurants and entertainment establishments. They are a big part of what makes our town unique.

The News Stallion on the move again

Former WPMI investigative reporter Josh Benrnsein hasleft KCRA in Sacramento and joined the Phoenix ABC affiliate KNXV as part of a four-reporter investigative team, according to News Stallion.

Rob Holbert is Lagniappe managing editor. Contact him at rholbert@lagniappemobile.com.

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