Oregonian up next

Rumor has it that Tuesday the Oregonian will be offering buyouts to many people in the newsroom and its plant. 50 must go in the newsroom, 100 company wide. As to the offer, many rumors...from a year to two years salary, plus some medical.

 

Must go? Is it a union shop because Newhouse doesn't do "must go's" to non-union, although everything is in flux nowadays.

 

Not a union shop.

 

Yikes...have a few buddies from college working there and have sent out messages. I hope at least some, if not all, of them make it through unscathed if/when it happens. Good luck to the rest of the Oregonian and Newhouse gangs, too.

 

God, the way things have been going this year, it might be easier just to start threads of the shops that have not or will not have layoffs/buyouts. *sigh*

 

Maybe we are but we just haven't found one yet.

 

Oregonian offers two years of pay and two years full benefits to employees of 10 years or more in its buyout offer. Benefits for dependents as well. Very generous package, they must mean business.

 

Not too shabby as far as getting a buyout.

 

More info here, complete with internal documents.

http://wweek.com/wwire/?p=12855

 

No shit, jackass. Thanks for the permission.

 

Newark ... Cleveland .... Portland.

Think about this. This is the Newhouse family, once described to me by a long-time Star-Ledger employee as "The Newhouse family doesn't throw out old furniture."
This is not greedy corprations looking for 24% profit margins. This is -- I believe -- the largest, and until recently very stable, family-owned media group in the country.
This is far more disturbing to me than Gannett or the Trib or McClatchy or anyone else cutting people.

 

anyone have a feel for what type of margins their papers generally operate with?