Independent newspapers disappear as private investment firms take over
Newspapers owned by small, independent groups — often families or businesses invested in their local communities — are shuttering at an alarming pace compared to those owned by large investment companies, according to a new report from Northwestern's Medill School of Journalism.
Why it matters: Independent newspapers are more likely to represent rural communities that are at greater risk of becoming "news deserts," or areas with extremely limited or zero access to local news sources.
Zoom in: The erosion of small, independent newspapers means that the majority of remaining papers in the U.S. will be even more heavily concentrated among larger hedge funds and private-equity-backed groups that tend to be less invested in local communities.
- "The scary thing about that is that those are the owners that have been doing it, many cases, for decades," said Tim Franklin, a senior associate dean, professor and John M. Mutz Chair in Local News at Medill. "They're the most passionate about their publications, and even those folks are beginning to throw up their hands."
By the numbers: Half of the 136 newspaper closures in America over the past 14 months have been from independent, for-profit newspaper chains that own five or fewer for-profit papers, according to Medill's 2025 State of Local News report.
- By comparison, only eight newspapers owned by investment firms shuttered in the same time period.
- Private newspaper companies, or groups that aren't owned by large investment groups but are still for-profit entities, also closed at an alarming rate.
Flashback: Researchers began sounding the alarm about the rise of "news deserts" a decade ago, back when private investment firms began gobbling up and consolidating local papers.
- But most of those closures occurred in suburbs where newspapers could more easily be rolled up into bigger, nearby city papers. Unlike the independent newspaper closures we're seeing today, fewer hyper-rural outlets were impacted by the large investment firm rollups.
Zoom out: The rate of newspaper closures in the U.S. has increased over the past few years, thanks to economic challenges driven by the pandemic and subsequent advertising market volatility.
- More than one-third (38%) of the 8,891 U.S. newspapers that existed 20 years ago have since shuttered.
- Today, 213 of all 3,143 U.S. counties have zero locally based news sources, up from 206 in 2024. There are 1,524 counties with only one local news source remaining, usually a weekly newspaper.
- Around 50 million people in the U.S. today live with limited or no access to local news.
Reality check: While there has been a significant rise in the number of digital-only local news websites that have emerged over the past few years, the vast majority of those news sites are concentrated in urban areas that face less risk of extinction.
- Today, there are 685 stand-alone digital news outlets, up from 662 last year, but less than 10% of those digital-only news outlets are located in counties designated as rural by the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
- While the vast majority of newspapers (95%) are for-profit entities, stand-alone digital local news outlets are much more likely (44%) to be nonprofits that rely on philanthropic funding. Philanthropic grants tend to be highly centralized in urban areas.
The bottom line: For years, small newspapers worried about getting gobbled up and squeezed by hedge funds and private equity giants. But newspaper economics have become so dire that there's little left for them to squeeze, and smaller groups can't stay in business any longer.
- The majority (60%) of remaining operational daily newspapers in the U.S. today are owned by 10 of the largest newspaper holding groups, such as Gannett/GateHouse and Alden Global Capital-owned MediaNews Group and Tribune Enterprises.
