This article is from page 29 of the 2009-12-22 edition of The Clare People. OCR mistakes are to be expected so download the original SWF or the rendered page 29 JPG
The Clare Champion newspaper last year incurred after tax losses of €3,000 per week as the recession hit the regional newspaper industry.
Abridged accounts for 2008 show after tax losses of €187,000 to the end of December last.
However, the company has strong cash reserves of €2.46muiullion as a result of accumulated profits over a number of years.
One of the few remaining inde- pendently owned newspapers in Ire- land, The Clare Champion is now in operation over 100 years and for the past four years has faced direct competition from The Clare People newspaper.
The Clare Champion accounts show the company remains in a healthy fi- nancial state though its financial as- sets took a hit last year going down from €988,188 to €864,995. As a result, the value of the company’s fixed assets dropped from <€4.4mil- lion to €4.2million. Cash at bank and in hand dropped from €1.073million to €1.072mil- lion. With shareholder funds drop- ping to €5.47million as a result of last year’s losses, the company had total funds of over €6.5 million The shareholders funds include a revaluation reserve which relates to the revaluation of the company as- sets. There was a gain of €1 million in the account in 2006, though last year there was no increase. The accounts are signed by the company’s General Manager, John Galvin and his wife, Shelley, who 1s also a director of the company. The paper is wholly owned by the Galvin family and its other directors include John Galvin’s mother, Gemma. A sister company, Clare Cham- pion Printers Ltd., also recorded a loss last year of €50,058. The filings show that the company’s accumu- lated profits now stand at €929,376. This company had cash of €267,791 at the end of 2008 - slightly up on the 2007 figure of €260,133. The Galvins also have a substantial shareholding in local radio station, Clare FM and were last year set to be the major winners from the station’s proposed €7.2 million sale to Radio Kerry. The family’s 51,000 shares would have delivered an estimated pay-off of €1 million but the sale fell through. General Manager John Galvin de- clined to comment on the accounts filed with the companies office.