Newspaper Work, With Warren Buffett as Boss

Warren E. Buffett’s views on newspapers have been a hot topic of late. Three years after telling his shareholders that he would not buy a newspaper at any price, Buffett has moved aggressively into the business, buying 63 papers and revealing a 3 percent stake in Lee Enterprises, a chain of mostly small dailies based in Iowa.

In a letter Buffett sent to the publishers and editors of all Berkshire Hathaway daily newspapers, he described himself as a newspaper “addict” who planned to buy more papers in the future. While he is less certain how he will make papers profitable in the digital age, he is confident that in certain cities, newspapers will thrive. “I do not have any secret sauce,” Buffett said. “There are still 1,400 daily papers in the United States. The nice thing about it is that somebody can think about the best answer and we can copy him. Two or three years from now, you’ll see a much better-defined pattern of operations online and in print by papers.” For his new employees, the best indicator of what Buffett may do is what he has done with The Buffalo News.