The Wayback Machine - https://web.archive.org/web/20160423010844/http://jimromenesko.com/2013/07/08/john-solomon-returns-to-the-washington-times/

John Solomon returns to the Washington Times

The Washington Times announced this morning that its former executive editor, John Solomon, is returning as editor and vice president for content and business development.

Solomon

Solomon

He replaces David Jackson, who resigned last week.

The paper also announced that the Washington Guardian, an online investigative news portal co-founded by Solomon in 2012, is being acquired by the Times.

The CEO’s memo:

To All Employees:

Today I named John Solomon to the joint role of Editor and Vice President for Content and Business Development, where he will have broad responsibility for the content, audience and business strategies of the company. In this role, he will oversee all news and opinion content in the newsroom as well as the advertising, sales and digital departments on our business side.

John has consistently been one of the country’s most compelling journalists over the last two decades. He has personally broken some of the most important stories while leading the reporters and editors around him to do the same. During his earlier stint at The Washington Times in 2008-09, the paper routinely produced compelling stories in print, online, radio and TV that attracted new audiences, created impact and won some of the profession’s highest honors. That’s exactly what I and the ownership want in this next phase of rebuilding the Times./CONTINUES

But just as importantly, John has pressed, pushed and prodded our profession to stretch beyond traditional business models and embrace the new audience and monetization opportunities of the 21st century. In his earlier stint four years ago, John helped the Times significantly improve the audience reach and financial condition of this company, and I’m glad he has returned to help put us back on that course to profitability.

In his role as a consultant the last several months, John has worked with me and the executive team of Loveia Johnson, John Martin and Keith Cooperrider to create new partnerships, products and advertising opportunities that have helped improve our company’s financial condition. The company’s ownership has been pleased by the progress and asked me to stay on at least through the end of 2015. I’m proud to do so and also to announce some of the executive team’s accomplishments:

* The Times now has the lowest operating loss in its 31-year history and is poised to reach profitability with the full confidence and financial support of its ownership

* The Times’ email list has grown seven-fold from 100,000 people in January to more than 700,000 today, providing a substantial new audience and revenue opportunity.

* Advertising revenues have doubled since we reorganized the Ad & Sales Department in March under John Solomon’s and Loveia Johnson’s leadership.

* Under John Martin’s leadership, the Times has moved to new printing presses that have given us crisper, cleaner and larger news pages and the ability to reach new audiences in our circulation market

* We have secured several new radio, TV and digital partnerships that will be announced in the next few weeks and will unveil both a new national digital edition of the newspaper and a new Web design by Labor Day

As part of the recent moves, we’ve said goodbye to some of colleagues, including our Executive Editor David Jackson. We appreciate the effort he gave us and wish him well in his next endeavor.

While there’s much good news to share, there’s also much more work to be done to reach profitability and to improve the compelling nature of our news and opinion reports. John’s appointment today moves us forward on the path toward those goals. Please join me in welcoming John aboard and don’t hesitate to drop by if you have questions.

Larry

Larry Beasley | President and CEO