Newspaper publisher Trinity Mirror has announced it is increasing its cost reduction targets by an additional £10m this year.
The company announced in March that it was looking for cost reductions totalling £10m during 2015.
However in a trading update issued today ahead of the publication of its 2015 interim results on 3 August, it says it is now increasing that target to £20m.
It follows a year-on-year fall in underlying revenues of 9pc during the first 26 weeks of the year, including an 11pc drop in print revenues.
The statement reads: “In light of the more challenging revenue environment the group has reviewed its current cost reduction programme and is now targeting structural cost savings of £20m for the year, an increase on the £10m target announced in March 2015.
“This coupled with ongoing cost mitigation actions and continued investment to drive digital audience and revenue will help underpin profits. The increased targeted cost savings will result in restructuring costs increasing by some £5m to £15m.”
In its regional division, the company is currently seeking up to 25 redundancies at its Birmingham and Coventry operations as part of the move towards more digitally-focused newsrooms.
In today’s statement, the group says it expects monthly revenue trends to be “impacted by further volatility” for the remainder of the year.
Most of the overall decline in print revenues was accounted for by a fall in advertising revenues, which were down 17pc with circulation revenues down 6pc.
However the 11pc drop in print revenues was partially offset by a 26pc increase in digital revenues compared to the first half of 2014.
The statement says: “We continue to deliver strong growth in our digital audience** with average monthly unique users and page views growing by over 50pc.
“The growth in audience drove an increase in digital display revenue of over 40pc. Mobile continues to be an increasingly important component of digital revenue growth and we are enhancing our products and advertising formats to take advantage of the ongoing opportunity in this area.”
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Oh dear, if I was an employee of this company I’d be scouring the jobs market pronto. Still, at least front line editorial staff can rest easy that it won’t be them, as the real wealth-generators, that’ll bear the brunt.
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As their digital growth is so great, why not take the plunge now, scrap all the print products instantly and run entirely online.
The advertisers will surely follow and so will the readers.
Job done. Future secured. Revenue and profits leap!
No. Thought not.
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Trinity Mirror’s continual efforts at positive spin on bad news have become embarrassing. Yes, the trading environment is challenging for newspapers and digital’s contribution is not compensating for print declines. Don’t mask the facts in an effort to confuse us all as this company has done so blatantly for the past decade.
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So what we have here is that digital revenues still do not offset falls in print revenues and that less people will be expected to do more in the digitally-focused newsroom. Which means that those editorial survivors will spend all day dreaming up click-bait, never leave the office and will under no circumstances actually report on the issues that matter to their local community.
Meanwhile, said local community switch off completely from what was once their trusted source of local news and the downward spiral will go on and on until there is nothing left but a black hole…..
Brilliant.
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I’m so glad I got out, and fear for good friends who still work for TM.
And why doesn’t it say, ‘as we expected, print revenue has fallen because the newspapers we produce are poor as we’re trying to shoehorn online content onto newsprint.’?
Awful, awful, awful.
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This will be my last post here promise but: “However, the 11pc drop in print revenues was partially offset by a 26pc increase in digital revenues compared to the first half of 2014.” What actual amounts do these respective figures represent? If something declines from £1m to £890k that’s an 11pc drop. If something goes up from £100 to £126, that’s a 26pc rise. I know which looks far worse to me. Also “an increased digital display revenue of over 40pc”. Excellent – from £100 to £141? As ever is the case with digital, hard numbers are nowhere to be seen. I wonder why that is.
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One day soon Trinity Mirror will just consist of a Twitter account and Brian Reade with wires attached to his head.
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Whatever happened to their mooted takeover of Local World?
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Perhaps if they cut a few of the well-paid “suits” who have caused much of the decline, they could save money and have some spare cash to invest in print journalists.
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@observer50 For the record, they have got rid of lots of ‘suits’ as you call them. And if they got rid of more, why would they invest in print journalists?
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Dick Minim – I am an employee of this shower of ****, and I’ve been looking for a long time. Currently, I’m waiting on the results of my application for volunteer redundancy which, as I’m sure you won’t be surprised to learn, is currently over-subscribed.
Meanwhile, surely the biggest eye-brow raiser in this article is the idea that an organisation such as Trinity Mirror could suddenly decide to double its proposed cuts half way through the year.
That really does have all the hallmarks of a company in serious trouble.
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DAVE – I don’t know. It’s gone very quiet, which in itself is worrying. Hopefully, if Trinity are looking to save £20mil in other areas, they haven’t got the cash to spend on us. Otherwise, I suspect I’ll be posting to this forum from home in the not too distant future.
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Be interesting to know how much of the increased digital revenue was down to sales reps moving an advertisers budget from print to web to hit a sales target or to get a bonus , robbing Peter to pay Paul as they call it, just sayin
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Slate Grey: Sorry to hear of your predicament. My initial post about editorial staff is pure sarcasm, of course, as editorial staff are as vital to a publisher’s financial health as good salespeople. However, they always seem first in the firing line, while people who don’t seem to have any relevant newspaper/journalistic skills and don’t produce anything, stay safe. Hope you get something soon.
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