Saga Reports 4Q 5 Percent Revenue Decline

Saga Communications, Inc. Tuesday reported net operating revenue for the year ended December 31, 2013 of $129.5 million compared to $130.3 million for the same period last year.

• Gross revenue exclusive of political revenue increased 3.3% for the year.  Political revenue decreased to $0.8 million in 2013 compared to $6.7 million in 2012.  
• Station operating expense increased $2.7 million (3.0%) to $93.0 million (station operating expense includes depreciation and amortization attributable to the stations).  $1.3 million of this increase was due to a $0.8 million increase in music licensing fees and a $0.5 million increase in health insurance costs. 
• Operating income from continuing operations was $26.3 million.  Net income for the period was $15.3 million ($2.64 per fully diluted share) and free cash flow was $21.6 million.
• For the quarter ended December 31, 2013 net operating revenue decreased 5.0% from the comparable period in 2012 to $33.8 million.  Political revenue decreased to $0.4 million in 2013 compared to $4.0 million in 2012.  Station operating expense increased $0.2 million to $23.8 million for the quarter (station operating expense includes depreciation and amortization attributable to the stations).  
• Operating income from continuing operations was $5.7 million.  Net income for the period was $3.2 million ($0.56 per fully diluted share) and free cash flow was $5.6 million.

Ed Christian

On Tuesday's conference call, Saga CEO Ed Christian told anaylysts, "We’ve always had a strong consumer confidence reinforcing strong radio and TV advertising revenues and with that said I kind of breathe a sigh of relief and it reduces all the anxiety for 2014. We have a number of initiatives that are coming up that are on the drawing boards right now that we’re working on to enhance our revenue for the year and that’s pretty important to us. We’ll share those as the year comes on it is a little premature and a couple of them we might even be able to talk about in a few weeks."

"Revenue growth is job one, make no doubt about that, that’s our whole thing here, is to continue to serve our markets, there are 244.4 million Americans that listen to radio in a given week we have a healthy audience out there and we can do our job in both radio and TV."