Free Press prepares to ax 10% of its staff

While officials from the Detroit Free Press and The Detroit News were sharing their “good news” this morning about better-than-expected increases in single-copy sales and Web traffic, the Free Press, owned by Gannett, was also finalizing lay offs of about 10 percent of its work force.

Late Thursday morning, Free Press Editor Paul Anger sent a memo to staff about job cuts at the state’s largest newspaper. The memo was leaked to Gannett Blog, and has been confirmed as authentic by sources at the Free Press.

Part of the memo follows:

Reductions will involve about 10% of both bargaining unit and non-bargaining unit staff. Here are bargaining unit job classifications that will have reductions, and the number of positions we plan to reduce in each:

Editorial Writers – 1

Part-time Reporters – 4

Artists – 2

Picture Editors – 1

Librarian – 1

News Archivist – 1

Designers – 1

Sports Agate Editors – 2

Editorial Research Assistants – 1

Part-time Editorial Research Assistant – 1

Copy Editors – 1

Part-Time Copy Editors – 2

Part-Time Web Editors – 2

One source at the Free Press tells Michigan Messenger that Free Press staffers have known the cuts were coming because of an overall decline in revenues from advertising, something that is happening at most newspapers across the country.

Earlier this year, the two newspapers announced they were reducing home delivery to three days a week — Thursday, Friday and Sunday — and moving toward a Web-focused news operation. Earlier on Thursday, the Associated Press reported the two newspapers, who are under a joint-operating agreement, announced they kept more subscriptions than expected during the home delivery transition and saw an increase in single-copy purchases. The companies said they also saw an increase in Web traffic.

The Free Press source said the companies kept subscriptions 10 percent above what had been originally projected.