The tabloid format would be desirable for logistical reasons. A tabloid is much easier to distribute than a broadsheet. The Examiner’s business model wasn’t a terrible idea. Their problem was that they distributed a News American-type product in traditional Sunpapers neighborhoods. They also ran six days a week, which was too frequent to be supported by advertisers. (No advertiser wants to run in a Monday paper. People in the business need to just understand that fact and work around it.)

The fundamental problem with The Sun, as a business and not as a civic institution, is that Reg Murphy created a big-city cost structure in a market that was deteriorating to middle tier size. Times-Mirror and Tribune followed his lead.

None of The Sun’s major non-editorial activities of the past 25 years have made any economic sense. Among other things, they built Sun Park (with big gov’t subsidies) without a plan for reuse of the vacated space on Calvert St. They bought Patuxent for a ridiculous price and ran it into the ground. They built a second printing plant for Patuxent in Belair, while Sun Park was running at a fraction of its capacity. While this was happening, the private sector economy in Baltimore was shutting down. Car dealers, nonprofits and realtors cannot support the cost structure created by these expenditures.

The Sun also alienated its advertisers with high-handedness and fake circulation numbers. The difference between the circ fraud at Newsday and the business practices at The Sun was only a matter of scale.

A twice-weekly tab would work, if someone with a realistic sense of the advertising market put it together. A “gray” tabloid, with a format similar to that of the Baltimore Business Journal, would be well-received in this town.