The Washington Post Company

Type	Public
Traded as	NYSE: WPO S&P 500 Component
Industry	Mass media
Founded	August 4, 1947
Headquarters	Washington, D.C., U.S.
Key people	Donald Graham (Chairman and CEO) Boisfeuillet Jones, Jr. (Vice Chairman)
Products	Newspapers Magazines Educational Services Television Cable television Electronic media
Revenue	US$ 4.724 billion (2010)[1]
Operating income	US$ 547 million (2010)[1]
Net income	US$ 278 million (2010)[1]
Total assets	US$ 5.158 billion (2010)[1]
Total equity	US$ 2.814 billion (2010)[1]
Owner(s)	Graham family
Employees	20,000 (2010)[1]
Website	www.washpostco.com

The Washington Post Company (NYSE: WPO) is an American mass media company, best known for owning the newspaper for which it is named, The Washington Post. The company also owns Kaplan, Inc., a leading international provider of educational and career services for individuals, schools, and businesses. In addition, the company owns The Slate Group, Express, El Tiempo Latino, The Gazette and Southern Maryland newspapers, The Herald (Everett, WA), Post-Newsweek Stations (Detroit, Houston, Miami, Orlando, San Antonio and Jacksonville), Cable ONE—a cable TV and Internet service provider with subscribers in midwestern, western, and southern states—and Avenue100 Media Solutions, an online lead generation provider. The company previously owned Newsweek and Newsweek.com, but sold the magazine in 2010 after years of financial losses.^[2]

The Washington Post Company history dates back to 1877, when the Post was first published. The Washington Post Company was incorporated in the District of Columbia in 1889,^[3] and remained a District of Columbia corporation until it changed its state of incorporation to Delaware in 2003.^[4] It is a public company, trading on the New York Stock Exchange under the ticker symbol WPO; it went public in 1971. It is headquartered in Washington, D.C.

Apart from the family of the late Eugene Meyer, Berkshire Hathaway is a substantial shareholder.

Education[link]

• Kaplan, Inc. — Kaplan is one of the world's largest providers of educational services. Kaplan focuses on three areas: higher education, professional training, and test preparation.

Headquartered in New York City under the leadership of CEO Andrew Rosen, Kaplan had $2.3 billion in revenue in 2008. It is The Washington Post Company's fastest growing division and its largest revenue producer.

The Kaplan Higher Education unit had campuses where students defaulted on federal loans at rate of higher than 30 percent—more than three times the rate at private, nonprofit colleges—according to data released by the U.S. Department of Education.^[5] The high default rate may even trigger the loss of student aid under federal rules that take effect in 2012.^[5] When students default on their debt taxpayers are stuck with the bill and the students have their credit destroyed. Kaplan's marketing campaign targets especially veterans, single mothers and low-income students.^[6][7] According to the U.S. News & World Report, only 33 percent of Kaplan students graduate within six years.^[8]

• StudentAdvisor.com - is the latest education resource launched by the Washington Post Company. StudentAdvisor.com is an education research (reviews written by students, alumni, and parents) and comparison destination (tools to download and compare multiple colleges) for students, parents, and lifetime learners.

Newspapers[link]

• The Washington Post
• The Herald — Everett, Washington
• La Raza del Noroeste — Everett, Washington Spanish-language weekly covering the Puget Sound area
• Express — A free daily commuter paper in the Washington Metro Area.
• El Tiempo Latino
• The Gazette (35 weekly newspapers and a subscription-based state-wide weekend business and politics newspaper, in Maryland; plus military newspapers and suburban Maryland real estate guides)
• Greater Washington Publishing
• Washington Post Writers Group

Broadcasting[link]

The official name of the broadcast division, dating back to the 1970s, is Post-Newsweek Stations. Post-Newsweek stations is based in Detroit, Michigan and currently owns six VHF stations, all in the Top 50 markets. All the stations are branded under the "Local Mandate," which happens to be a station standardization adopted by Post-Newsweek. (Examples: KPRC is "Local 2" and WPLG is "Local 10".)

Post-Newsweek also owned two other television stations in the past. Both were at one time or another company flagships.

Cable[link]

• Cable ONE — Phoenix, Arizona

Interactive[link]

• The Slate Group

• Avenue100 Media Solutions — A leading analytics-based performance marketing company.

• SocialCode - A digital agency specializing in Facebook and Twitter marketing.

See also[link]

• Lists of corporate assets

References[link]

External links[link]

• Official website