Red Letter Day: Hundreds of Newspaper Jobs Cut
Hundreds of newspaper jobs have disappeared this week as media companies start to slash costs as the economic crisis continues to drive the newspaper death spiral.
Gannett Co Newspapers were hardest hit in what is likely to be the first rounds of cuts, but other newspapers weren’t spared either.
The biggest cut came to the Battle Creek Enquirer, with 50 jobs lost as the newspaper will now outsource printing to the Lansing State Journal.
Rochester New York’s Democrat and Chronicle will lose a net 59 positions, although the actual job loss is 48 when excluding the decision to cancel open positions. 34 employees have been terminated and a further 14 have accepted voluntary redundancy for a total staff cut of 8%.
Wilmington, Delaware based The News Journal has lost a net 44 jobs including 33 redundancies.
The Pensacola News Journal has cut 10% of staff or a total of 28 positions, consisting of 21 full time and 7 part time positions.
The Tallahassee Democrat has eliminated 25 positions including 16 employees and 9 open jobs. The company has a remaining 260 employees.
The cuts weren’t restricted to Gannett though, with Clarity Media Group’s Washington Examiner cutting 101 positions through the closure of its printing plant. Future work will be outsourced to two independently owned printing plants in Frederick and Hartford County.
Cox Newspapers have announced the closure of its Washington Bureau for a loss of 3 staff. Cox’s metro newspapers The Atlanta Journal-Constitution and Dayton Daily News will manage their own Washington and international newsgathering independently following the national bureau’s closing through dedicated correspondents in D.C.
Across the pond, Newsquest’s three Glasgow titles, the Herald, Sunday Herald and Evening Times are slashing 30-40 positions, according to Journalism.co.uk.
A red letter day for Newspapers, but this is only the first of many cuts to come, with Gannett Co committed to 10% across the board cuts at all its papers.
Update: more Gannett Cuts here.
