photo by Boyd Loving
Newark-based Star-Ledger newspaper cutting 167 jobs
The Star-Ledger’s announcement of 167 job cuts — among 306 layoffs made by owner Advance Publications Inc. Thursday — reflect long-running troubles at the state’s largest newspaper, which has felt the impact of a nationwide drop in newspaper readership and advertising revenue.
Thursday’s cuts are the latest in a series of layoffs and buyouts since 2008 at the Newark paper, a New Jersey institution that has won three Pulitzer Prizes but lost millions of dollars in recent years. The cuts include 40 jobs in the newsroom, which is not unionized, bringing it to a staff of about 116, down from a high of 350 before the first buyout in 2008.
In addition to the Star-Ledger cuts, 124 full and part-time jobs were eliminated at other daily and weekly papers owned by Advance Publications Inc., in New Jersey and Pennsylvania, and 15 at the company’s web site, NJ.com.
The layoffs are part of a plan announced last week by Advance to create a new company, NJ Advance Media, based in Woodbridge, to provide advertising, marketing and news content to The Star-Ledger, the three other daily papers in New Jersey and Pennsylvania, and NJ.com. The company plans to focus on efforts to grow its digital operations.
Star-Ledger employees were called in Thursday for one-on-one meetings, where they were either told they were being let go or offered a job with the new company. The new jobs, in some cases, carried salaries more than 5 percent lower, along with reduced benefits, according to employees who asked not to be identified. According to the newspaper, the cuts included the entire full-time business staff and positions in sports, features, photos and news. (Lynn/The Record)
Who really reads newspapers anymore? My daily train commutes were once full of people reading newspapers. I don’t see a single person doing that these days. Everyone has they attention fixed on their phones and tablets.
The Record is next with its nonstop diatribe about 3 days of traffic.
The Record has survived since nobody bothers to compete with them.
In this day and age, an online competitor could squash them (allow free access and have paid advertising)
What will our Mayor do without Chris Harris ?
Back in the early 90’s, in an attempt to sell more papers The Record took some old anecdotal story and tried to destroy a small mom and pop financial industry in NJ.
It is with pleasure I am now witnessing the The Record’s slow painful demise.
I do feel bad for the employees but I know that the management and owners are getting what they deserve.