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June 23, 2005updated 22 Nov 2022 3:52pm

15 jobs to go at Observer

By Press Gazette

Fifteen jobs are to go at the loss-making Observer in a move which
may be timed to help pay for the title’s switch to a Berliner format
next year.
The cutbacks will be across all departments and Guardian Newspapers has confirmed that journalists will be among those going.
The paper’s circulation has been stable over the
last two years at around the 440,000-mark. But it has remained
loss-making and is understood to be subsidised by its daily stable-mate
The Guardian.
The two papers made a combined loss in 2003/2004 of £6.2 million on
turnover of £227.5 million.
Guardian Media Group is spending £50 million on
new presses to convert both the Guardian and Observer into mid-size
Berliner formats (in between broadsheet and tabloid).The Guardian is to
switch in the autumn and the Observer is to change early next year.
Guardian
Newspapers chief executive Carolyn McCall said: “The Observer continues
to be a Sunday success story, with monthly sales increased by more than
11 per cent over the last five years, but in a changing media market
we, like other media organisations, need to control our costs
rigorously.
“We believe this will make the Observer a
stronger, more efficient, newspaper. These measures, however
regrettable, have to be seen in the context of a massive long-term
investment in the future of the Observer with the switch to the new
Berliner format in early 2006.
“We would like these redundancies to be voluntary and only if absolutely necessary will they become compulsory.”

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