Sunday, January 11, 2009
Sunday | Jan. 11 | Your News & Comments
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18 comments:
Jim says: "Proceed with caution; this is a free-for-all comment zone. I try to correct or clarify incorrect information. But I can't catch everything. Please keep your posts focused on Gannett and media-related subjects. Note that I occasionally review comments in advance, to reject inappropriate ones. And I ignore hostile posters, and recommend you do, too."
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Hi, there. I'm off to a very late start today. How are you?
ReplyDeleteSo far on rumor central?
ReplyDelete1)There will be layoffs across the board starting around Feb 20th
2)Layoffs will be on a paper by paper basis with profitable papers being spared and the others will see more cuts
3)Unpaid time off,of up to 1 week's time
4)more outsourcing of circulation
5)Outsourcing of printing to AFL?
Well anything else to add to the BS??
Hear all the publishers are meeting this week at one site location.
ReplyDeleteFYI
ReplyDelete39% of all us companies laid off employees in 2008. 23% plan to layoff employees in 2009. It's going to be brutal in 2009. Do what you can to keep your job.
Sleepy. :(
ReplyDeleteCan someone please tell me who designs/paginates/lays out the Journal News in Westchester. I was looking at it today and it looks horrible! The front page is a jumbled mess. Maybe part of their problem is that the paper simply LOOKS BAD. It's turning off readers.
ReplyDeleteIf the higher-ups there realized that and actually put out a better-looking paper, maybe more people would buy it.
Get your B.S. correct, 10:57. The rumor was layoffs start Jan. 20, not Feb. 20. We have seen various figures posted, the largest of which is 23 percent.
ReplyDeleteIf they spent as much time on the product as they do in meetings then maybe we wouldn't be in the mess we are in !!!
ReplyDeletehey 12:17 you must be gannett managment.Maybe 10:57 made a mistake ?
ReplyDeleteI don't want Curtis Riddle involved in the product, thanks very much. He should stick to practicing locking himself in his office.
ReplyDeleteHey Jim -- check out the Poughkeepsie Journal's Web site today. The paper is apologizing to readers for delivering Sunday's papers late because of snow (though not mentioning that the Journal shut down its presses and is now printing many miles away in Westchester, NY).
ReplyDeleteBut the POJO's readers know why the papers were late .... in the comments section, they're talking about how customers and customer service are being hurt by the POJO's greedy decision to shut its presses down.
This from the Honolulu Agonizer.
ReplyDeleteWith union contract negotiations ongoing, a recent proposal by the Guild to accept a wage reduction of 10% was turned down by John Jaske. No counter offer was made.
Guess they are sticking to the original Gannett proposal of a 31.5% wage cut.
Is there anything we can do to get leadership to think more long term than the pain and hardship a sudden furlough may cause? If the time line rumored is real, this is evidence of a bunker mentality at work.
ReplyDeleteThe inability for real planning only will convert into SOME savings. Fewer stories, less internal customer service and (the big one) lost revenue comes with this.
Reps off for a week always lose extra time in catching back up. The idea it is a vacation is not a way to think here because it is an additional week for a large number of people which are budgeted ad sales earning weeks. Is anyone calculating?
The money saved will get missed by Wall Street. Consider many comments from the past few days.
If you take what 11:42 am said together with comments from Jan 8: 8:52 p.m. (and the follow-up), We do need to reset profit expectations without ruining good papers in the process.
Company-wide cuts in the newspaper industry don't really make sense. Make every reader and journalist suffer because a newspaper elsewhere is having a harder time?
6:53 is correct, and company-wide cuts don't make sense. But the decline in revenue shows that Corporate's grand strategy for the future of GCI has failed, and there is no other alternative but to cut, and to cut deep. It is the consequence of a badly-flawed business plan to begin with. Those of us in the fields aren't part of the great brains trust that puts together these plans, so we have no control over them. We are just pawns in their game.
ReplyDeleteOne poster said:
ReplyDelete"We do need to reset profit expectations without ruining good papers in the process."
Sorry, the papers have already been harmed, many irreparably. You don't get it. This isn't about saving journalism or keeping strong local daily papers.
It's about corporate profits...always has been.
Staffs that once had 10-12 reporters now have 3-5. Reporting beyond the basic cop shop and local prep sports is not possible with the current (and future) staffing levels.
It's over.
Wake up and smell the coffee.
8:39 you are so deep. Pawns in their game. I guess you haven't read about the world economy lately. But then deep minds like you don't deal in facts anyway. Grow up. We are in a recession. What do you and your lemming friends propose the leaders of the company do? You don't work for a nonprofit. If you want to go see teh folks at the United Way.
ReplyDeleteThe constant saying that we are down 20% in revenue for 2009 and we were down 20% in 2008 vs 2007...well this is going to happen my friends...Just think about what has happened over the last 4 years...the real estate boom then banks are closing...we are going to feel the down slide as we had such a boom previously that we are bound to feel the pain...i believe that if we were to look at newspaper numbers for 2003, we are right on target...prior to the boom!
ReplyDeleteWe need to step back...IF we invested appropriately we would not be in this situation...As told by Craig...we are STILL a PROFITABLE company, we just have to somehow let wallstreet see this...NOW what is up with all the cuts?!?!?!?
It's all about Wall Street and analyst/shareholder "expectation" ... if the company, as profitable as it is, doesn't meet "expectation", then we have the cuts were are having as of late.
ReplyDeleteOne can hope GCI's new tactic will bring out people in the communities to start up competitor papers. Many of our markets lack them since Gannett bought up nearby weeklies ...