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Cash-cow classifieds still sluggish
[SEATTLE] As newspaper executives gathered here last week for the Newspaper Association of America's annual conference, they expressed relief the war in Iraq was over mixed with renewed economic concerns.
Attendance rose significantly from last year's 734, according to the NAA's count of around 900 attendees this year, but such signs of sanguinity were not universal.
"The war set us back. There is uncertainty," said P. Anthony Ridder, chairman-- CEO of Knight Ridder and the incoming NAA chairman, who said the outlook is now "a little slower than I expected" in early '03.
Some put matters more mordantly. "I was talking with some people about how everyone had budgeted for a turnaround in the second half of 2003-- like everyone had for 2002," said Chris Anderson, publisher of the Orange County Register, who noted no such turnaround seems likely but that "one of these years we're bound to get it right."
PICKUP IN RETAIL ADS
Executives spoke of seeing signs of a pickup in retail advertising after the war had depressed it, but help-wanted advertising-the largest compovent of classified advertising and still newspapers' biggest revenue stream-remained...