NJ media company buying The Landmark, other community papers Gannett planned to close

David Dore, Leominster Champion
·2 min read
The Landmark has been acquired by CherryRoad Media.

A fast-growing newspaper company is entering New England with its purchase of four local weekly papers.

CherryRoad Media is buying The Landmark in Holden, the Leominster Champion, the Millbury-Sutton Chronicle and The Grafton News from Gannett, which also owns the Worcester Telegram & Gazette.

The sale, which a Gannett spokesperson said will close late next week, means the company’s plans to close The Landmark and print its final edition Sept. 15 have been scrapped.

“When we heard about the potential closure of The Landmark, The Grafton News, the Millbury-Sutton Chronicle and the Leominster Champion, we reached out to Gannett to see if they could be saved,” CherryRoad Media CEO and founder Jeremy Gulban said. “The bond between these newspapers and the numerous communities they serve is strong. We are excited to engage with Gannett to enable the continued operations of these newspapers as part of CherryRoad’s growing family of community newspapers.”

CherryRoad Media is based in Parsippany, New Jersey. Gulban is also CEO of CherryRoad Technologies, a software modernization company offering technology solutions such as cloud hosting and other network systems. His father started the business in 1983, and Gulban took over operations in 2008.

CherryRoad entered the industry with its first publication in late 2020, and as of early August owned 64 newspapers in 10 states. With the addition of three Michigan weeklies just last week and the four Central Massachusetts papers, that tally has risen to 71 papers in 12 states.

“This is one of our ways to give back to our community by acquiring media houses that add so much value to our daily lives but are suffering the brunt of digital age by losing subscriptions,” Gulban said on the company’s website. “CherryRoad has a successful track record of enabling technologies that play an important role in the ‘digital fabric’ of the community and we will use this acumen to enhance the online experience of these media assets.”

Kristen Payson, editor of The Landmark, will continue to oversee the paper, which covers Holden, Paxton, Princeton, Rutland and Sterling.

This article originally appeared on Leominster Champion: N.J. media company buying community papers Gannett planned to close