Strong year for Hearst, parent of Chronicle
Amid roller-coaster financial markets, rising inflation and global unrest, Hearst Corp., the parent company of The San Francisco Chronicle, “met the moment” and generated “record results,” its CEO wrote in an annual letter to employees Tuesday.
Hearst CEO Steven R. Swartz outlined the company's achievements in his letter to Hearst employees on Tuesday. Among its media holdings, Hearst oversees 24 daily and 52 weekly publications including The Houston Chronicle and The San Antonio Express-News along with other media ventures.
“The importance of our diverse portfolio cannot be overstated,” Swartz wrote, adding that Hearst Newspapers, its television businesses, and its overseas magazine operations all had strong performances over the past year, even despite an array of challenges.
Swartz's letter did not cite specific figures about revenues and profits last year. Hearst is a private corporation and not required to publicly disclose financial information.
Swartz wrote that “economic uncertainty and rampant inflation” upset bond markets around the world and made business particularly challenging for one of the company's biggest sources of profits, Fitch Group.
Given those global factors, no company, even Hearst, is immune, he wrote.
“With the looming threat of a global downturn or recession and central banks around the world continuing to raise interest rates in order to beat back inflation, this year also presents a host of challenges and a very difficult environment in which to try to grow,” Swartz wrote. “No doubt this is a time for all of our businesses to reexamine what they are doing and eliminate any unnecessary or out-of-date practices.”
Still, Hearst made substantial investments in 2022, including taking steps to make the company more sustainable, diverse and inclusive, and making big financial investments. Hearst reinvested more than $200 million in capital projects and $100 million in new product developments, which included the creation of new jobs and growth products, Swartz wrote.
The company also acquired several emerging growth companies, such as Full Throttle Technologies, a software company that focuses on automotive data.
The company also awarded a bonus to every eligible employee around the world who had worked with Hearst for at least half of the year.
The company, headquartered in New York City, marked its 136th anniversary in 2022.
“Over the past 136 years, we've learned that it is in difficult times that really strong companies keep investing, keep improving and end up taking market share from those who can't stay the course,” Swartz wrote. “Once again, this year we will invest more than $100 million in incremental new product development with growth projects in every one of our divisions.”