New Media to buy family-owned 'Columbus Dispatch'

Ownership of The Columbus Dispatch is changing hands after 110 years.

The paper's owner, Dispatch Printing Company, has agreed to sell its publishing operations to the New Media Investment Group, a holding company based in New York City.

Terms of the deal were not disclosed, but New Media said it plans to pay with a combination of cash and $25 million loan. It expects to complete the acquisition in the second quarter of 2015.

In a letter to readers, John Wolfe, the paper's publisher whose family has owned the Dispatch since 1905, said the decision to sell was "extraordinarily difficult" but was driven by a recognition that "single-city, independent, family-owned newspapers... lack the economies of scale to adapt" to the speed and digital age.

"The paper's future success is most enhanced within a newspaper company that has both regional and national reach," he wrote.

The Dispatch, with a circulation of more than 130,000 daily and 235,000 on Sundays, is part of a deal that also includes suburban ThisWeek weeklies and seven magazines, including Columbus Monthly, and the Dispatch's printing plant. The Dispatch Printing Company will retain its non-print media and a real estate company.

New Media Investment publishes 126 daily publications in 32 states, including Cape Cod Times and Rockford Register Star. The holding company emerged from the bankruptcy of GateHouse Media in 2013.