Berry Co. history
1910: Loren M. Berry launches his company from a rented desk in downtown Dayton.
1986: The company is sold to BellSouth Corp., one of the post-deregulation "Baby Bells."
2008: Local Insight Media Holdings acquires Berry.
2010: On Nov. 16, Berry and 17 other related companies, including Local Insight Media, simultaneously file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection.
The Berry Co. LLC, the Moraine mainstay that made its name producing the Yellow Pages, will maintain its local work force of 300 employees despite its voluntary Chapter 11 bankruptcy filing, a company spokeswoman said Thursday.
“We expect that it’ll be business as usual at our Dayton campus and our other locations,” said Pat Nichols, spokeswoman for Local Insight Media Holdings of Englewood, Colo., which purchased Berry in April 2008. “We have no plans to make staffing changes or reduce jobs as a result of the announcements Wednesday.” The company has 900 total employees.
Berry and 17 related companies, including parent Local Insight Media Holdings, simultaneously filed voluntary Chapter 11 petitions Wednesday in United States Bankruptcy Court in Delaware.
Berry listed assets and liabilities in the range of $500 million to $1 billion. The top unsecured creditors are private equity firm Welsh, Carson, Anderson & Stowe and Associates of New York ($297 million), of which Local Insight is a portfolio company, and US Bank National Trust Association of St. Paul, Minn. ($210.5 million).
On Aug. 17, Local Insight Regatta Holdings, the subsidiary that owns Berry, announced first-half 2010 revenues of $266.1 million, down 8 percent from $290.1 million in the first half of 2009.
Berry serves 240,000 advertisers in 42 states, publishing 850 Yellow Pages directories for phone companies. It also provides online listings, video advertising and website and search-engine services.
Berry’s Yellow Pages directories were hugely successful, especially in the days before telephone company deregulation. After the breakup of AT&T in 1984, Berry began facing competition in the form of similar directories published by others.
“They didn’t appear to be very different (than the Yellow Pages) in people’s eyes,” said Irene Dickey, a University of Dayton marketing lecturer who has followed the company. “In a lot of cases, (competitors) were just copying what Berry did and letting Berry do the work.”
She said companies like Berry faced their biggest challenge with the advent of Internet search engines like Google, which put the ability to look up business phone numbers “at people’s fingertips.” Customers formed Internet search habits while companies like Berry lagged behind, Dickey said.
But she said Berry has solid strategies to stage a comeback, working on online search products that will help both customers and advertisers.
“They’re in a tough industry,” she said, but, “I feel that they know what they need to do.”
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