Cutting the Losses: Details of the Valassis Sale

Valassis' earnings statements paint a picture of a company facing troubling financial questions about its core products, and management's answer last year was to find a buyer for the firm the late George Valassis started in 1970 in Oak Park.

The buyer turned out to be San Antonio-based Harland Clarke Holdings Corp., one of the many pieces of New York City-based MacAndrews & Forbes Holdings that's owned by Ronald Perelman, a private equity industrialist estimated by Forbes this year to be one of the wealthiest Americans at $14 billion.

Under the deal, Valassis will become a private company