The Root returns to Black ownership
By Brian Stelter, CNN
(CNN) — The Root, a groundbreaking website for and about Black America, is returning to Black ownership for the first time in years.
Ashley Allison, a Democratic political strategist and CNN commentator, said Thursday that she is acquiring The Root from G/O Media, a digital media holding company controlled by a private equity firm.
Allison said she plans to invest in video content, strike new partnerships with experts, and launch in-person experiences for The Root’s readers.
“This isn’t about making more content but rather about making meaning of this moment,” Allison said, a describing a precarious political time “when journalism is under attack and audiences are seeking independent sources for news.”
Allison was an official in the Obama White House and national coalitions director for the Biden-Harris 2020 campaign. The Root is the first acquisition by Watering Hole Media, a company she founded last year. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.
The Root was founded in early 2008 by Harvard University professor Henry Louis Gates Jr. and Donald E. Graham, who was chairman of The Washington Post Company at the time.
“The Root will be a 21st-century version of a national black newspaper,” The Post reported at the launch.
Univision, the Spanish-language media giant, acquired The Root in 2015 and assembled a portfolio of online brands — only to scrap that strategy and sell the titles to Great Hill Partners, a private equity firm, in 2019.
The resulting company, G/O Media, couldn’t post the kind of rapid growth that investors expected, and it began to sell titles like Lifehacker, The Onion and Kotaku.
By last summer, The Root was the only piece of G/O Media left, and not for lack of buyer interest. G/O Media CEO Jim Spanfeller called The Root a “very good business” and “a truly powerful and important voice in Black America” in a July essay.
Gates, who was a minority owner at the outset in 2008, praised Allison “for returning The Root to its roots.”
In a statement, Allison said the website “has always been about preserving culture and creating clarity in a world full of distractions. Owning the power to tell our own stories is a rich tradition The Root is committed to upholding.”
The-CNN-Wire
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