Meredith (MDP) Sees 10c/Share Charge in Q2; Won't Affect Adjusted Outlook

Meredith Corporation (NYSE: MDP);(www.meredith.com) said today it recorded a net special charge of $7 million ($4 million after-tax, or $0.10 per share) in its fiscal 2013 second quarter. The charge was related to business realignments and selected workforce reductions designed to realize the full value of recent acquisitions, and as part of an ongoing process to optimize performance and achieve further cost efficiencies.

Meredith has aggressively scaled its capabilities to deliver content over multiple platforms to meet increased consumer demand and growing client requests for multiplatform advertising and marketing programs in the past year. As a result, Meredith has added or created approximately 300 jobs to support key strategic growth initiatives including the:

• Acquisition of Allrecipes.com, doubling Meredith's digital presence. The addition made Meredith the No. 1 digital food media company, and moved it to No. 3 in the digital women's lifestyle category.
  
• Addition of the EveryDay with Rachael Ray and FamilyFun brands. These moves increased Meredith's share of the U.S. magazine industry advertising revenues to its current level of nearly 12 percent.
  
• Purchase of ShopNation and launch of a growing e-commerce platform.
  
• Execution of digital, mobile, video and social expansion strategies, including creating tablet editions; developing new mobile apps; and expanding video content creation capabilities.
  
• Expansion and monetization of Local Media Group video content through an increase in local news programming, along with more national video content creation.

Meredith reaffirmed today its earnings outlook for the second quarter of fiscal 2013 of $0.85 to $0.90, and for full fiscal 2013 of $2.60 to $2.95, both excluding the special charge. Meredith will update progress on its strategic growth initiatives, as well as its earnings outlook, when it releases fiscal 2013 second quarter earnings on January 24, 2013.

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