An accountant with more than 30 years experience analyzing damage claims in lawsuits testified today that the SF Weekly’s practice of selling ads below cost damaged the Bay Guardian badly – and he put the financial toll at between $5 million and $11 million.
Clifford Kupperberg took the stand in the Guardian’s predatory-pricing suit against the SF Weekly and its corporate owner. The Guardian is charging that the Weekly for more than seven years violated the state law barring companies from selling a product below cost for the purpose of harming a competitor.
Guardian attorney Ralph Alldredge walked Kupperberg through the detailed process of how he evaluated the Weekly’s and the Guardian’s costs, the price of display ad space in the two papers, and the projections he made of how much the Weekly rate-cutting had harmed the locally owned paper.
If the jury finds that the Weekly and Village Voice Media, the chain formerly known as New Times, broke the law, Kupperberg’s calculations will be the basis for awarding monetary damages.