To those of us here in San Diego there’s a been there/done that ring to this: USA Today, the USA’s second largest newspaper, is going to lay off some 130 staffers, dramatically reorganize its existing traditional newsroom structure, start to de-emphasize print and put the big push on multi-platform info venues — in effect, taking a deep breath and trying to focus on being a learner news organization operating within a new 21st century media context and an ailing economy.
Why is this familar to us here in San Diego? Because after the Copley Press sold the San Diego Union-Tribune (my former employer) to Platinum Equity, it laid off hundreds of talented people, dramatically reorganized the newsroom (copy editors were laid off), completely redesigned the paper to effectively purge the product of the old Copley-owned image, and touted ad nauseum about the fact that the new company wanted to be a multi-platform company.
So now we see this. Media Life:
It’s not going as far as to abandon print for digital, but USA Today is shaking up its approach to the news by de-emphasizing the print brand and focusing more on the web and mobile devices.
The result of that shakeup will be another round of layoffs in the beleaguered industry, with 9 percent of the Gannett publication’s 1,500 employees getting the boot.
The plan was laid out yesterday for the staff of the newspaper, which is No. 2 in circulation to the Wall Street Journal.
“We’ll focus less on print … and more on producing content for all platforms (Web, mobile, iPad and other digital formats),” said a slide in a show played for the staff to announce the changes. The Associated Press got a copy of the presentation.
Roughly 130 people will be laid off as the paper eliminates individual managing editor positions for the Sports, News, Money and Life sections and replaces them with so-called content rings, which will focus on different subject areas.
The shakeup comes amidst circulation and advertising declines at the paper, which shook up the staid newspaper industry when it debuted with colorful graphics and short, punchy stories in 1983.
Since 2007, USA Today has lost nearly a half-million readers. And the AP reports that ad pages during second quarter were off by half from 2006.
In a press release the newspaper announced the creation of five new departments as part of the reorganization, including Digital Development, headed by Steve Kurtz, which will “focus on developing and maintaining technology and systems to support USA Today’s existing dotcom, mobile, iPhone and iPad platforms.”
The press releases, which heralds the creation of several new executive positions, does not explicitly mention the layoffs. In an interview with The Associated Press, Dave Hunke, the newspaper’s publisher, said that the shake-up is “pretty radical.”
USA Today will focus more attention and resources on digital products, including its iPhone and iPad applications, and a new “content group” will collaborate with Rudd Davis, its vice president of business development.
“Davis, the founder of sports website BNQT.com, is being brought in to oversee new business opportunities and brand licensing among other things,” the AP reports. “BNQT, which focuses on sports such as skateboarding and skiing that appeal to younger audiences, was bought by Gannett in 2007.”
There can be several reactions to this. First, it’s a fact that news organizations based mainly on their print product are hurting. Many already have decent websites but some are either perfunctory or a secondary priority to the print product, which increasingly seems as outdated as broadcast networks’ 30 minute evening newscasts. Secondly, USA Today has been a kind of “old faithful,” a paper that offers solid content, a readable style and can be purchased in most places of the…USA. It seldom got the recognition it deserved..
But companies have seen the future and they have concluded that they can’t survive if it’s on news delivered once a day (and quickly outdated by TV and the Internet) printed on processed dead trees. And the twin pincers of the economy and the need for less people mean more layoffs for these organizations. So the change makes sense but is a sad one and a gamble:
USA Today was launched during a time when there was a need for a broad-brush national paper, Gannet saw and opening and launched it and despite traditional newspapermen tsk-tsking its colorful look and shorter stories, thrived.
Then other newspapers adopted the colorful look and shorter-stories.
But now with the Internet and other platforms, there’s less of a need for a national print paper since reading print newspapers is not on the things-to-do list of many young adults and and young people. They go to the multi-platforms where the San Diego UT hopes to thrive and where USA Today hopes to survive.
Here’s some reaction from media blogs:
Publishing executives would be wise to closely watch USA Today‘s moves. While the paper has long been derided as a journalism lightweight, it has a history of innovation in adapting to changing audience tastes. Many publishing veterans sniffed at USA Today in the early days, believing its formula of short stories without jumps, large infographics and generous use of color represented a dumbing down of news. A few years later, nearly all of them had adapted the same style. In the years since, USA Today has solidly established itself as a national institution with a readership of more than 1.8 million.
It’s particularly interesting that USA Today has made such a public commitment to harmonizing its editorial and advertising operations. This is a bitter pill for traditionalists to swallow, but a necessary one if professional news organizations are to thrive in the future. We believe that win-win solutions are possible when creative minds seek them. Few have done so to this point, and USA Today‘s strategy shift shouldn’t be dismissed until it’s had a chance to work.
–The Gannett Blog offers the full text of the publisher’s message detailing the planned changes.
—The New York Observer’s Media Mob:
USA Today publisher Dave Hunke is cutting 9 percent of his staff and shuffling the executive deck at the paper. “This gets us ready for our next quarter century,” Mr. Hunke told the Associated Press.
It’s still unclear which sections of the operation will be hardest hit, although it looks like 130 people will be out of a job.
The move comes with the creation of five new departments: Business Development, Product Development and Design, Vertical Development, Digital Development and USA TODAY Sports, which will be its own national brand and pull together sports content from across Gannett’s many properties.
The Gannett blog’s take was that this had been expected for a long time, but “the big, unfortunate surprise, however, is that it took this long; includes so few key details or rationale, and relies on so many people with relatively little serious news-gathering experience.”
The good news: USA Today, the second largest newspaper in the U.S., is finally getting with the times and reorganizing to put more emphasis on digital and less on print. The bad news: That means 130 members of its 1,500-person workforce will be laid off this fall.
The layoffs are not a surprise, it is a Gannett paper after all. But these schemes… I see problems. First, the paper might attempt to surmount the small issue of its rather poor quality before thoughts of storming the World Wide Webs take hold. I’ve met a lot of editors, and none nearly so self-righteous as unnamed USA Today editor. The goal, as I understand it, is to plaster articles with “infographics,” and that USA Today does well. How will they cover their shame with graphics when some mobile devices don’t support them?…
To follow media blog reaction to this GO HERE.
Joe Gandelman is a former fulltime journalist who freelanced in India, Spain, Bangladesh and Cypress writing for publications such as the Christian Science Monitor and Newsweek. He also did radio reports from Madrid for NPR’s All Things Considered. He has worked on two U.S. newspapers and quit the news biz in 1990 to go into entertainment. He also has written for The Week and several online publications, did a column for Cagle Cartoons Syndicate and has appeared on CNN.