Staff Reductions Taking Their Toll

The steady stream of newspaper staff and budget cuts is beginning to be felt on the street.

Politico reports on the shrinking ranks of regional reporters covering Capitol Hill – the local Regional Reporters Association’s membership has dropped from 200 to 84 in a decade – and suggests that a lot of politician shenanigans may be going uncovered thanks to the dearth of watchdogs looking out for local interests. However, the story notes that specialty newsletters and publications like Congressional Quarterly have grown their staffs and that the total size of the congressional press pool has stayed about the same as a result.

Ken Doctor notes the broad trend toward cuts in newspaper business coverage and speculates about how newspapers can maintain a foothold in this area, which is often critical for ad sales. He sees national and international organizations like Dow Jones and Reuters increasingly syndicating their coverage to smaller papers in almost pre-packaged form.

E&P Totes Up the Numbers, and They Aren’t Good

Top U.S. newspapers have lost about 1.4 million copies in daily circulation, says Editor & Publisher. Declines of 20% or more have occurred at the LA Times, SF Chronicle and Boston Globe. Only two papers covered in the report – USA Today and the New York Post – managed to increase circulation. Factors include competition from other print and online media, publisher iatives to cut discounted or free copies and the creation of a national do-not-call list.

Despair and hope

Veteran journalist-turned-academic Tim McGuire writes a remarkably somber confession on his Arizona State University blog titled “I suddenly feel a lot worse about the future of newspapers.” The catalyst was comments by Reid Hoffman, the co-founder of LinkedIn. Hoffman apparently said that newspapers’ model of mixing profits with civic responsibility is fatally flawed. The two objectives just don’t mesh. This and other comments left McGuire, 58, feeling like he and others of his generation just don’t get the Internet enough to envision a newsroom’s future. Strong words for a man who’s supposed to be doing just that for his students. “Hoffman convinced me I’m way out of my element,” he comments.

Reid Hoffman weighs in with a lengthy comment on McGuire’s post, proposing to offer “some rays of hope.” However, there’s little hope evident in what he says.

Meanwhile, the publisher of the San Antonio Express-News exhorted his colleagues to fight the good fight at the Texas Daily Newspaper Association’s annual convention. Thomas Stephenson said that investing in digital platforms is only part of the solution. Newspapers have to earn reader loyalty and then make it easy for advertisers to reach them through whatever channels they can.

Bay Area Newspaper Group (BANG) was able to avoid involuntary layoffs because 107 out of 1,100 employees took a recent buyout offer. The cuts affect the Contra Costa Times, Oakland Tribune and 14 other daily and weekly newspapers. The president of the company said he couldn’t guarantee there wouldn’t be more cuts. BANG executives cited a “drastic economic slump.”

• Ryan Sholin offers proscriptions for the Merc on his blog. They including ending the ghettoization of bloggers and podcasters, ditching the focus on national news and switching software platforms.
• Meanwhile, more than 100 members of the San Jose Newspaper Guild’s Mercury News unit dressed in black and rallied in front of the paper to show their support for laid-off workers. Oft-quoted Guild unit president Sylvia Ulloa vowed to show management that employees are “united, not intimidated.” That works okay when the owners are making money, but that doesn’t seem to be the case these days.
• Michael Bazeley writes an early obit for the Merc. He doesn’t blame the new owners as much as some other disenfranchised ex-employees, but rather sees the Merc’s troubles as being rooted in rudderless leadership and lack of vision. When technology journalism exploded, the Merc stood still, he says. That was its big opportunity and the paper blew it. Now, he concludes, “I fear the paper will not recover.”
• Robert Butche writes not about the Merc but about the shockwaves of fear that the firing of LA Times editor James O’Shea sent through newsrooms and protests that “owners devoid of newspaper experience have been lulled into believing that a newspaper can flourish and survive by downsizing.” True ’nuff. The problem is that when the business shows declining readership, declining advertiser interest and no long-term hope of reversing those trends, an aggressive investment strategy isn’t a very palatable option, either.

The Albuquerque Tribune, a newspaper that won a Pulitzer Prize as recently as 1994, will publish its last issue on Saturday. Circulation at the afternoon daily had dwindled from 42,000 in 1988 to just 10,000. Owner EW Scripps Co. had put the paper up for sale last August, but the only serious bidder wasn’t able to close the deal and no other interested parties emerged. Editor Phil Casaus said the last three editions will feature stories about The Tribune’s role in Albuquerque journalism. The 38 editorial staffers were informed this morning.

The Tribune was founded in 1923 and was part of the country’s oldest joint operating agreement. Under the deal, the Tribune and the Albuquerque Journal operated separate newsrooms, but combined business operations. Afternoon papers have been hit particularly hard by the advertising slowdown. BusinessWeek said there are only about 600 of them left in the U.S., down from 1,000 in 1990. See also the Reuters coverage.

Newsstand Mags Drop Circ, ‘Time’ Plummets – MediaPost, Feb. 12, 2008

[Once upon a time, a year-to-year decline of almost 20% in Time magazine newsstand sales would have been big news. Today, hardly anybody notices. Time recently redesigned to make its look less cluttered and more open, but it seens that readers prefer the dowdy old Economist – with its boring design, provocative writing and insightful analysis – over the eye candy that US publishers dangle in front of them. Time has company, BTW: Newsweek‘s newsstand sales were off 16% and U.S. News‘ were down 8%. – Ed.]

For Publisher in Los Angeles, Cuts and Worse – New York Times, Feb. 18, 2008

[The New York Times profiles the controversial publisher of the Los Angeles Times, David Hiller. His unpleasant assignment has been to make sweeping changes at the troubled west coast institution, but his style has rubbed a lot of people the wrong way. Detractors call him evasive and sneaky, while supporters say he’s just carrying out a difficult job. His approach to the newsroom is viewed by some as meddlesome. Last week, he named Russ Stanton editor, the fourth person to hold that title in three years. Stanton has most recently been in charge of the LATimes.com website, which should offer some insight into what Hiller is thinking. – Ed.]

Dramatics Intesify at the New York Times – social|median, Feb. 12, 2008

[Apparently, big investors in The New York Times Co. aren’t amused at the stock’s 50% drop in value over the last four years, and they’re putting some of their people in place to change direction. The Sulzbergers aren’t going quietly, though. Jason Goldberg summarizes. – Ed.]

Tribune Co. Will Cut Up to 500 Jobs – Editor & Publisher, Feb. 13, 2008
[New Tribune Co. owner Sam Zell initially told employees that he planned to grow the company out of its recent troubles, but those plans are evidently on hold for now. The layoffs only amount to about 2% of the total workforce. In a novel twist, they’ll be funded with overages from Tribune’s employee pension plan. The struggling LA Times will lose 40 to 50 editors. – Ed.]

Tribune Plans More Cuts; Courant May Lose 45 Jobs — Hartford Courant, Feb. 14, 2008
[The Hartford Courant will get caught up in the Tribune Co. layoffs, losing 45 positions, with 10 of them in the 240-person newsroom. -Ed.]

Tribune to cut 400 to 500 companywide, 45 at Sun — Baltimore Sun, Feb. 14, 2008
[It appears that 45 is the magic number for layoffs at Tribune Co. papers. The Baltimore Sun also expects to shed that many jobs. – Ed.]

New York Times Plans to Cut 100 Newsroom Jobs – New York Times, Feb. 14, 2008
[With 1,332 employees, the Times’ newsroom is still by far the largest in the industry. No competitor has more than 900 newsroom staffers. Nevertheless, pressure from shareholders can’t be ignored. An interesting note in this piece is that Rupert Murdoch says he’s committed to making the Wall Street Journal a formidable competitor to the Times and is ready to add to its 750-person newsroom staff in order to do so. – Ed.]

Star Tribune Sinks Deeper Into Oblivion – True North, Feb. 12, 2008
[The Minneapolis Star Tribune will cut 58 more jobs on top of the 145 positions it cut last spring. That will leave the paper with about 1,900 employees, or about 10% smaller than it was at this time last year. No editorial employees are affected by this round of layoffs. Most of the cuts are due to efficiences from an outsourcing contract.

In a recent memo, publisher Chris Harte echoed a now-familiar refrain: “Total revenue (print and internet advertising and circulation) is down almost $75 million in the last two years. Classified revenue has been the hardest hit part of our business, and our 2007 classified revenue was down over 50 percent from what it was at the start of the decade.” – Ed.]

Publisher GateHouse to cut 60 Mass. jobs – The Boston Globe, Feb. 14, 2008
GateHouse Media Inc. is cutting 60 positions at its Massachusetts publications, including The Patriot Ledger in Quincy, The Enterprise of Brockton, and dozens of suburban papers, according to an employee briefed on the plans.

Lost printing contract likely leading to job cuts – Champaign-Urbana News-Gazette, Feb. 9, 2008
The News-Gazette will have to cut costs – and probably jobs – as a result of the Chicago Tribune’s decision to print all of its editions in Chicago, News-Gazette Publisher John Foreman said. The News-Gazette will continue printing the Tribune until April 26, when seven of the 24 jobs in the pressroom will be eliminated.

‘Charlotte Observer’ Announces Job Cuts – Editor & Publisher, Jan. 31, 2008

Well, that was fast.

On Tuesday, Transcontinental Media of Montreal announced that it was shutting down the Halifax Daily News, effective immediately. By the next day, the newspaper’s home page had already been relaunched as Metro Halifax, one of the expanding network of free Metro dailies being stamped out by Metro International S.A.

The Daily news just couldn’t continue, said Marc-Noel Ouellette, senior vice-president at Transcontinental. “It was costing a fortune.” The Daily News’ tiny circulation 20,000 put it at a competitive disadvantage against the much larger Chronicle Herald.

The shutdown means that 92 people will lose their jobs, although some 35 of them are expected to find employment with Transcontinental or the new daily.

Metro International has been busy bringing the McPaper concept to local markets. Its Metro dailies sport a common look and feel and are designed to be read in 20-25 minutes. More than 100 Metros are being published around the world right now and, if the current pace of shutdowns continues, there’ll be no lack of new market opportunities for the owner.

Welcome Web wunderkind Marc Andreessen to the deathwatch!

In a savage post on his blog, the Netscape co-founder announces “I hereby inaugurate my New York Times Deathwatch, which will continue until the last Sulzberger has left the building.”

The diatribe was touched off by the announcement that arch-conservative Bill Kristol will become a Times columnist, but Andreessen has problems with the whole Times company, and he lists them with withering eloquence:

• Total quarterly revenues fell 1.7% compared to Q4 2006, adjusting for an additional week in the 2006 quarter;
• Ad revenue in December was off 25%
• Classified advertising fell off the table
• Circulation continues to decline at the NYT-owned Boston Globe – 7% in the last year;
• The Times’ regional papers are also suffering;
• Hedge funds are pressuring the Sulzbergers to sell;
• The board of directors knows nothing about publishing (this one is particularly funny).

Meanwhile, Dan Kennedy at The Guardian muses on the possibility that Google could buy the New York Times Co. It isn’t gonna happen, but it’s fun to speculate.

The Financial Times has all the gory financial details.

Inquirer Publisher Seeks More Cost Cuts – AP, Jan. 23, 2008

Quoting: “The owners of Philadelphia’s two largest newspapers said they need tocut costs by an additional 10 percent or the company will face dire consequences…Philadelphia Media Holdings LLC would have trouble meeting debt payments if it doesn’t make changes…[A columnist says:] ‘We’ve gone through a series of economic cuts in the past years, and it is hard to see where they can cut further.’…One year ago, the company gave layoff notices to about 70 Inquirernewsroom employees, or 17 percent of the editorial staff, and laid off 34 people in advertising, or nearly 10 percent of the sales force.”

Inquirer Staffers React to Tierney’s “10 Percent” Threat – The Daily Examiner, Jan. 23, 2008
[The Philadelphia magazine website account adds some facts and color:

• The Guild is speculating that the threat of cuts is a bargaining tactic against the union;
• A Guild memo says executives “did not say what would happen if savings targets are not met, but made references to outsourcing jobs overseas.”
• One features writer asks “Who needs a Neighbors section when we could have the New Delhi Digest every day?”
• Quoting: “When Eagles head coach Andy Reid was suddenly scheduled to appear at an impromptu news conference, an editor went running through the newsroom looking for somebody, anybody, to cover it. ‘There are situations like that every day,’ says a staffer. -Ed.]

Metro – Sources: Globe will cut back staff, raise price – Metro, Jan. 24, 2008
[A strange media war is playing out in Boston, where the Globe and an alternative daily paper in which it owns a significant interest are competing with each other to scoop each other’s bad news. The Globe recently scooped the Metro in reporting the paper’s mounting losses. – Ed.]

Quoting: “The Boston Globe will soon announcecutbacks at the newspaper, including hundreds of layoffs, and anincrease in the per copy price of the paper to 75 cents as of Feb. 1,according to several sources inside and outside of the paper….The Globe saw a nearly 7 percent decrease — from 386,417 to 360,695 —in its daily circulation between Sept. 2006 and Sept. 2007.”

Globe says no big layoff coming — its Metro free paper got it wrong – Boston Business Journal, Jan. 24, 2008

[A Boston Globe spokesman says a report of impending layoffs of “hundreds” of Globe staffers published by Metro, a free paper in which the Globe owns a 49% stake, are false. However, his wording leaves plenty of wiggle room. The spokesman said the story is “factually incorrect” (how is this different from “incorrect?”) and that “There are no plans for a staff reduction of the size cited in the Metro.” His wording leaves leeway for the Globe to lay off up to 199 people and still call the Metro story incorrect. -Ed.]

The Sun May Be Getting Smaller, but We Won’t Give Ground On Local News – Kitsap Sun, Jan. 12, 2008

[The editor of the Kitsap Sun, which has been ravaged by staff cuts, declares his intention to continue the paper’s local news coverage. -Ed.]

After Job Cuts in 2007 — What’s Ahead? – Editor & Publisher, Jan. 15, 2008

[An E&P editor recaps the grim ledger from 2007, when US newspaper industry employment declined almost 3%. -Ed.]

Meanwhile, layoffs at the Chicago Sun-Times announced nearly a month ago continue to generate lots of coverage:

Sun-Times staffers get pink slips…by phone — chicagotribune.com, Jan. 23, 2008
[Management apparently just can’t wait to get laid-off staffers out the door. -Ed.]

Sun-Times wrestles with new reality – LATimes Pressmen Forums

No Quiet on Western Front: Latest on ‘L.A. Times’ Uproar – Editor & Publisher, Jan. 22, 2008
[E&P tries to figure out what really happened at the Los Angeles Times, where editor James O’Shea abruptly resigned this week. Publisher David Hiller called O’Shea’s exit after only 14 months a mutual decision, but reports of O’Shea’s speech to the newsroom indicates it was anything but. The EIC was reportedly asked to cut $7 million from his budget, which sparked a confrontation that led to his firing. Media-watchers are wondering what this says about new owner Sam Zell’s commitment to editorial quality. -Ed.]

Times editor to leave paper – Los Angeles Times, Jan. 21, 2008
[The LA Times plays it straight in covering the story, revealing little of what was said in the newsroom. – Ed.]

Text of James O’Shea’s Remarks on WSJ.com

O’Shea, Hutton Thrown From Speeding Rollercoaster – Content Bridge, Jan. 22, 2008

Veteran journalist Ken Doctor notes the departure of the fourth LA Times top editor in three years and laments the sorry state of the once-great Mercury News. There are 200,000 students in journalism programs in the US, he notes. What are they all going to do? Big metro dailies are plummeting like a speeding roller coaster, but the new media entities that may someday replace them are still too small to offer refuge. – Ed.]

Newspaper Editor’s Departure Is Troubling – U.S. News & World Report, Jan. 22, 2008

[A U.S. News columnist worries about what O’Shea’s firing means, but believes newspapers can weather their current crises. -Ed.]

Recovering Journalist: Another One Bites the Dust
[Mark Potts makes some good points about what’s wrong with traditional newspaper-think and why the industry needs to look outside for leadership. -Ed.]

Dramatic Losses Force Union-Tribune to Lay Off Employees – voiceofsandiego.org, Jan. 16, 2008
[The paper, which won a Pulitzer Prize in 2006, has cut about 15% of its newsroom employees in the last three years as Sunday circulation has plummeted 19%. Owner Copley Press’s Washington, D.C. office has been cut in half. Copley CEO Gene Bell wrote in a memo: “[A]ll communications media now face destructive competitive forces seldom seen before…never in our history have we faced revenue losses as dramatic as those of the last 12 months.” -Ed.]

Beaver County newspaper announces employee layoffs – Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, Jan. 15, 2008
The Beaver County Times in Bridgewater announced Monday that it has laid off 10 full-time and 11 part-time employees in what it calls an effort to eliminate duplication of duties and to streamline production.

[Newport News] Daily Press to cut 14 jobs — dailypress.com, Jan. 14, 2008
[The Newport News paper has cut nearly 100 jobs in recent years as circulation has shrunk 20% since 1995. -Ed.]

Post-Tribune workers face layoffs – NWITimes, Jan. 12, 2008
[The northern Indiana newspaper is cutting 20 positions as part of the broad cost-reduction initiative by parent Sun-Times Media Group. – Ed.]

Allentown, Seattle newspapers will cut jobs – Reuters, Jan. 9, 2008
[I’ve already noted the cuts at the Seattle Times. The new information is about the loss of 10 positions at the Morning Call in Allentown, Pa. This appears to be less than 5% of total staff. -Ed.]