Watch Washington Post Publisher Bristle at ‘Grievance Session for the Guild’ During Town Hall Announcing Layoffs (Video)
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The Washington Post says it will undergo layoffs in 2023, as the legacy news organization struggles to grow and maintain its reader and user base.
The news was announced by publisher Fred Ryan in an employee town hall on Wednesday.
The job cuts will affect less than 10% of the Post’s staff, Kathy Baird, chief communications officer at the Post, told The Hill. She said plans will be made final in the coming weeks.
“The Washington Post is evolving and transforming to put our business in the best position for future growth,” Baird said. “We are planning to direct our resources and invest in coverage, products, and people in service of providing high value to our subscribers and new audiences. As a result, a number of positions will be eliminated. This will not be a net reduction in Post headcount. Recently, we have made some of the largest investments in The Post’s history and 2023 will be another year of continued investment.”
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Washington Post Has Lost 500,000 Subscribers Since Biden Took Office
Video of the town hall made its way to Twitter. In it, Ryan can be heard cutting the meeting short, saying he didn’t want to turn it “into a grievance session for the guild. Thank you.” One video, posted to Twitter by national correspondent Annie Gown, had been viewed more than 1 million times. Watch that video below.
NEW: @washingtonpost publisher Fred Ryan refuses to take staff questions after announcing Q1 layoffs in “Town Hall” @postguild pic.twitter.com/C4HOXb6y2C
— Annie Gowen (@anniegowen) December 14, 2022
The Washington Post has lost 500,000 subscribers since January 2021, according to a report last week by The Wall Street Journal.
As compared to the 3 million subscribers the publication had in January 2021, the Post currently has over 2.5 million subscribers, the Journal reported, citing sources with knowledge of the company’s finances. Despite being on track to generate around $600 million in revenue in 2022, the Post is not expecting to make a profit this year, the report said.
While the Post let go of 10 staffers from its print Sunday magazine news in a cost-cutting move, the greater media industry is also facing layoffs and restructuring as CNN and Gannett laid off hundreds of employees across their news operations, while BuzzFeed slashed 12% of its workforce within the past week.
Loree Seitz contributed to this report.
