Whether it's owning up to ill-advised hookups, letting go of the past, or making the most of what works, The Knot's (Nasdaq: KNOT ) latest quarter is a lot like a trying marriage.
Its latest quarter had a bit of owning up to adulterous indiscretion (writing down the value of 2006's WeddingChannel.com acquisition), shedding the old (there was a 14% year-over-year plunge in its old school publishing business), and finding ways to grow everywhere else.
Revenue inched 3% higher to $25.1 million. The results were weighed down on the print-publishing side, though online advertising rose marginally during the period. The uptick may not seem like much, but it stacks up well when pitted against the 8% plunge in online advertising at Yahoo! (Nasdaq: YHOO ) and AOL (NYSE: AOL ) during the same three months. Google (Nasdaq: GOOG ) grew faster during those same three months, but that new-media darling is on an entirely different plane from everybody else.
Pre-tax profits before the asset impairment hit clocked in at $1.7 million, or $0.05 a share. The Knot isn't breaking down how that sum would've been taxed, but it's safe to assume that analysts had a good read on the wedding-media company in projecting a taxed profit of $0.03 a share on $25.3 million in revenue.
The Knot needs the recession to go away and for site visitors to get back to planning lavish weddings. The company earns its keep primarily from wedding-service providers who advertise on its site and from bridal-gift shoppers who hit up its Web-based registry.
Investors can always take heart in the 20% surge in net sales at Blue Nile (Nasdaq: NILE ) during the holiday quarter. Diamond engagement rings are a specialty, and if marriage proposals are being made, it will mean eventual traffic for The Knot's flagship site. It's not a perfect proxy, but it beats following some of the site's broader bridal registry partners such as Macy's (NYSE: M ) and Williams-Sonoma (NYSE: WSM ) .
The Knot gets points for bouncing back before the non-Google online-advertising market, but it has to do better than this if it wants its relationship with shareholders to thrive and last.
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