Mitch Garber says he’d buy the Gazette
Mitch Garber says he never aspired to own a newspaper, but he’s prepared to buy the Gazette to keep an anglo paper alive in Montreal.
If he did, I bet he’d build the sports section into something special, but does anyone know anything about his politics?
shawn 20:15 on 2023-02-15 Permalink
But then he subsequently (I think) said on twitter that Postmedia isn’t interested in selling. They’d rather cut it to the bone and keep it.
Kate 20:31 on 2023-02-15 Permalink
Postmedia are nuts.
shawn 20:40 on 2023-02-15 Permalink
According to Mitch it still makes a profit so that’s really all they care about.
(I believe Postmedia is owned by hedge funds, if I recall correctly)
Kevin 22:02 on 2023-02-15 Permalink
Postmedia doesn’t care. It’s not their country.
I am surprised that any of the PostMedia papers are still publishing, but the end day is getting closer.
It will always baffle me how the Canadian government allowed the country’s newspapers to be sold to a foreign company.
Ian 22:09 on 2023-02-15 Permalink
Wait until you hear about why FM radio sucks.
Joey 09:55 on 2023-02-16 Permalink
I assume Garber is your typical centre-right rich guy – didn’t he boast in his twitter thread about this that he’s “a capitalist”? He has also has lamented the fact that kids in Quebec don’t grow up learning about important businessman, mentioning Couche-Tard founder Alain Bouchard specifically (he told the Canadian Club “If it’s important for our children to know Carey Price’s statistics, we should also tell them who is Alain Bouchard”), which strikes me as an odd thing for a human person to think.
Anyway, he’s clearly a defender of Anglo rights but is realistic about the importance of ensuring Quebec is a primarily French society, and has criticized Anglophones, and the Jewish community specifically, for not doing more to engage in French-speaking life.
When I was a kid I always enjoyed his segments on Mitch Melnick’s afternoon show…
shawn 09:59 on 2023-02-16 Permalink
Articles are saying that all of the profits from Postmedia go towards paying down hundreds of millions of dollars worth of debt that Chatham also acquired when it purchased the company. So I wonder what happens when the debt is paid off, if that ever is possible?
Kate 11:58 on 2023-02-16 Permalink
I was reminded that Garber was part of the consortium that was so keen on bringing Major League baseball back. So if he was able to buy the Gazette, it would probably become a platform for campaigning for baseball in a big way. Sports journalists have nothing to lose – an entire extra professional team gives them more to write about, more of a raison d’être for a sports section.
Josh 12:09 on 2023-02-16 Permalink
I always find your angle on sports curious, Kate. Honestly one could regard reporters on any beat in this way: An education reporter would probably love an extra university on which to report, arts reporters clearly would love more galleries and theatres, business reporters more corporate HQs in their cities, etc.
Journalists who cover a beat do like a robust beat in their town, it’s true!
Joey 12:14 on 2023-02-16 Permalink
@Kate I doubt it. Isn’t the land that group was looking at being developed? There’s nowhere downtown to put a stadium, especially if the ballpark is supposed to be an ‘anchor’ for a much larger and more lucrative real estate project. But, more to the point, Bronfman/Garber/etc. got burned big time by Major League Baseball – they thought they had the MLB owners on board with their whole ‘sister city’ idea with Tampa, only to have the rug pulled out from under them. Afterwards, Bronfman was pretty blunt with the press (“This chapter’s closed. At this point, I kind of put my hands in the air. I was really sold on the project we were working on. It’s not happening. I’ve not given much thought to anything else. Would I love to see Montreal have a baseball team? Of course. How is it going to happen? I don’t know. Is it viable? I think so, (but) I don’t know. We’re a major-league city. People have my email. They have my number. I’m happy to help and discuss — but not today.”) His bitterness and resentment are palpable; I’d be surprised if any of that gang were ever to go anywhere near MLB again.
Garber has since become a part owner of the Seattle Kraken NHL team, which is probably scractching his ‘I wanna be a sports team owner’ itch…
shawn 12:57 on 2023-02-16 Permalink
Wow, here’s what Mitch just tweeted:
“Twitter was not my chosen avenue but here we are: my inbox is flooded with interested Quebec-based billionaires, executives, editors & advertisers. What do they want ? 2 things : Save The Gazette and make all our part of it locally owned and run. Gazette owners court..meet ball.”
Kate 13:58 on 2023-02-16 Permalink
Josh, obviously no sports writer is going to argue against a new team. New teams, new matches and new sports events are grist for their mill. I don’t think it’s wicked, it’s just human nature. Even if a sports writer has doubts whether Montreal could sustain an MLB team now, when it couldn’t in the past, it would hardly be in their best interest to say so.
Following our argument that all reporters like to see more topics to write about in their specialty, what does that say about crime reporters?!
Josh 15:07 on 2023-02-16 Permalink
I had that thought after I posted, Kate! I think there could be something to it. Reporters do not like slow news days generally, and news in the A section is, typically, not good news.
And I agree with Joey: I don’t think in the near-term there are prospects for MLB’s return to Montreal. The cities bandied about most frequently in those circles in the past year or three seem to be Las Vegas, Portland and Nashville. Even Vancouver gets mentioned now and again in writeups about future expansion cities, but Montreal has mostly fallen off the radar.
shawn 15:30 on 2023-02-16 Permalink
Could we stay on topic? The only sports on Kate’s blog should be Alouettes football. Please.
jeather 16:12 on 2023-02-16 Permalink
Christopher Curtis wrote about this, too. Says pretty much what you expect. I assume the debt is the same kind of leveraged buyout that, eg, Musk just used to buy twitter, where the new owners buy a new company and immediately saddle it with huge amounts of debt.