Guardian, Financial Times and Telegraph furlough staff as coronavirus hits newspaper revenue
The Guardian, Financial Times (FT) and Telegraph today said they will furlough dozens of employees as the coronavirus outbreak decimates advertising revenue for news organisations.
Guardian Media Group (GMG), which runs the Guardian and Observer, said it expects revenue for the first six months of the financial year to fall by £20m due to a collapse in advertising.
As a result, the company has furloughed roughly 100 non-editorial staff and offered a voluntary reduced hours scheme for other employees.
GMG said it will also cut pay for board members and management — including editor in chief Katherine Viner — and defer its planned pay rise for all UK staff.
It comes despite an increased demand for the newspaper’s coverage, with the company reporting record levels of digital subscriptions in the last six weeks.
A Guardian spokesperson said: “While we are well-placed to weather difficulties thanks to the strategy implemented over the last four years, it is clear that we will need to adapt as we always have, in order to serve Guardian readers and meet the challenges and opportunities ahead.”
The FT and the Telegraph today also announced a string of measures to help mitigate the impact of the pandemic.
The Telegraph has furloughed roughly 90 employees over the last two weeks, while non-editorial staff will move to a four-day week from 1 May and take a 20 per cent pay cut.
In an email to staff, seen by City PM, Telegraph Media Group chief executive Nick Hugh said the company had enjoyed its biggest month for subscription growth in March, with total subscriptions now at 442,386.
However, Hugh said the company was still battling a cashflow problem, as monthly subscription payments were lagging behind the immediate impact of lost advertising revenue.
“These are measures that no business wants to implement, but given the scale of the challenges that we are facing we must protect both our business and our employees in a way that other media organisations are also doing,” he wrote.
Meanwhile, the FT said it will cut salaries for top managers and editors by 10 per cent for the rest of the year, while pay for board members will be reduced by 20 per cent.
The newspaper will also put roughly 20 non-editorial employees on paid leave and temporarily halve its pension contributions.
In a note to staff chief executive John Ridding said he would take a 30 per cent pay cut.
National and regional news organisations across the UK have been forced to roll out drastic measures as they battle the combined impact of declining advertising revenue and falling circulation caused by the lockdown.
In a note to clients last week Enders Analysis forecast publisher advertising decline of 30 per cent this year, with roughly £330m disappearing from the sector.
It also warned that the hit to revenue could lead to as many as 5,000 journalists losing their jobs.