History
American City Business Journals, Inc. was founded in 1982 by Mike K. Russell with the launch of the Kansas City Business Journal.[1] Three years later the business became a public company via an initial public offering and was traded as an over the counter stock.[1] Starting 1985, ACBJ set out to acquire as many as fifty business newspapers across the United States. The goal was to establish a network of newspapers selling national advertising packages.[4]
In 1986, ABJC acquired all the publications owned by Mark Vittert and his company, Business Journal Publications Corp, for $40 million. The sale included business journals in Cincinnati, Baltimore, Pittsburgh, Philadelphia and St. Louis.[1] Later that year American City merged with Scripps Howard Business Journals. At the time the division of Scripps-Howard Newspapers operated publications in 10 cities: Los Angeles, Seattle, San Diego, San Francisco, Dallas-Fort Worth, Houston, Phoenix, Atlanta, Washington, D.C and Miami/Fort Lauderdale.[5]
After expanding to 35 weeklies, ABJC faced mounting debts and losses reaching $13.5 million in the first nine months of 1987. This resulted from sales of national advertising packages falling short of goals amid the 1987 stock market crash. The company began divesting in 1988. ACBJ sold eight publications to various unnamed buyers, including five business newspapers in Westchester, Rochester, Richmond, Hartford and Southern Connecticut; St. Louis Magazine and partial-ownership of two legal papers: St. Louis Daily Record and St. Louis Countian.[6] Two weeks later ACBJ sold another six of its business newspapers in Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Milwaukee, Indianapolis and San Jose and Sacramento to Metro Collegiate Publications for $46.3 million.[7] Then Russell sold his controlling stake in the company.[8]
In 1989, Shaw Publishing, Inc., owned by Ray Shaw and The Oklahoma Publish Co., purchased a million shares of common stock in ACBJ for $22.75 million. Shaw was then elected as the company's chairman and chief executive officer. Previously he retired earlier in the year from working as president of Dow Jones & Company.[9] Shaw served as ABJC's chairman for two decades. Under his leadership, the company moved its headquarters from Kansas City, Missouri, to Charlotte, North Carolina, and greatly increased the number of its publications.[2] In 1995, ACBJ was acquired by Advance Publications for US$258.8 million (equivalent to $485.2 million in 2024).[10] A year later ACBJ acquired CityMedia Inc., which published six business journals in Boston, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Milwaukee, Minneapolis and Sacramento.[11]
In 2001, the company partnered with Microsoft to provide content for bcentral.com.[12]
In 2007, the company acquired Inside Lacrosse.[13]
In 2012, sister company Condé Nast redirected Portfolio.com to the startups page of ACBJ.[14]
In 2020, the company launched a book publishing partnership.[15][16][17]
