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Trinity Mirror’s rolling restructure: the story so far

Marketing picturesMarketing picturesThe ongoing restructure of Trinity Mirror’s regional operations dates back to its takeover of Local World in a £220m deal last autumn.

Since then the company has been embarked on a process of integrating the former LW titles within its regional business, at the same time as continuing to refine its ‘digital first’ approach in its existing newsrooms.

Around 75 editorial roles across the country have so far either been lost or been placed at risk, while seven former LW editors have either left or announced they are leaving.

Here’s a timeline of how the story has unfolded as covered on HoldtheFrontPage.

* 28 October 2015. Trinity Mirror takes full control of Local World in £220m deal hailed as “transformative” by CEO Simon Fox.  Read more.

* 17 December 2015. Trinity Mirror announces it has begun the process of integrating LW within its regional business.  Read more.

* 14 January 2016. Local World’s ‘weird news’ platform Quirker becomes the first casualty of the takeover as it is axed after seven months.  Read more.

* 22 January 2016. Jon-Paul Hedge of the Exeter Express & Echo becomes the first former LW editor to leave the combined business. Read more.

* 8 February 2016. A new editorial structure for the combined business is unveiled with the appointment of six new regional editors-in-chief.  Read more.

* 8 February 2016. Up to 25 photographic roles are placed at risk at former LW titles in the East Midlands and South East. Read more.

* 29 February 2016. Trinity Mirror decides to keep the Cambridge News in its portfolio rather than sell it on Iliffe News and Media. Read more.

* 13 April 2016. Cambridge News editor Paul Brackley announces he is leaving after seven years in the role. Read more.

* 14 April 2016. Kevin Booth announces he is quitting as editor of the Leicester Mercury for “personal reasons.” Read more.

* 15 April 2016. Up to eight jobs set to go at Exeter Express & Echo and Mid Devon Gazette as websites merge. Read more.

* 22 April 2016. Neil White announces he will step down after four years as Derby Telegraph editor. Read more.

* 25 April 2016. Around 14 jobs are placed at risk at former LW titles in Bristol, Somerset and Gloucestershire with 13 websites to be merged into three. Read more.

* 4 May 2016. Dave Atkin leaves his role as Scunthorpe Telegraph editor after it is merged with that of the Grimsby Telegraph. Read more.

* 5 May 2016. Trinity Mirror reveals it is targeting £12m in ‘synergy savings’ from the LW integration process. Read more.

* 6 May 2016. Nuneaton News to go from daily to weekly with four jobs lost while another four are placed at risk in South Wales. Read more.

* 10 May 2016. Rob Stokes of the Western Daily Press and Lynne Fernquest of the Bath Chronicle become the latest editors to go. Read more.

* 11 May 2016. Staff of the Black Country Bugle set to be cut from five to two with editor John Butterworth among those at risk. Read more.

* 26 May 2016. At least 15 more jobs set to go in Essex, Kent, Surrey, Liverpool, North Wales and Birmingham. Read more.

* 27 May 2016.  Features roles are placed at risk at the Leicester Mercury with the reigning regional Feature Writer of the Year among those under threat.  Read more.

* 7 June 2016.  Eight jobs set to go with six new ones to be created at the Manchester Evening News and Huddersfield Daily Examiner Read more.

* 14 June 2o16. Three more weekly editors – Paul Dent Jones, Roger Kasper and Rebecca Smith – to leave the business as new editorial structure is unveiled in Essex, Kent and Surrey.  Read more.

8 comments

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  • May 27, 2016 at 2:54 pm
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    I’d comment, but I’m too busy weeping into my keyboard.

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  • May 27, 2016 at 6:38 pm
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    JP shares slumped to a new all-time low today. The company is a basket case, they’ve been destroying their paper products for many years and their websites are pathetic. Very soon JP will start a programme of massive closures and job cuts. You heard it here first.

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  • May 28, 2016 at 7:31 am
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    I wonder if history’s tyrannical regimes would have fared better if they’d labelled their policies ‘rolling restructures’?

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  • May 29, 2016 at 9:57 am
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    Ah Sebastian, thanks for your kind words, but it’s difficult to do so when people you have worked with for years disappear around you. It’s also tiresome waiting for your turn. As I mentioned on another thread, there’s more on the way.

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  • May 30, 2016 at 12:07 pm
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    The ‘ongoing restructure of TM’s regionals doesn’t date back to the takeover of Local World’ – it goes back much further.
    Half the Trinity Mirror editorial staff had been ditched before the company bought LW.
    They have been offloading staff since the penny dropped that digital revenue will never offset the loss of print income.
    It’s the misery-go-round that never stops!

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  • May 30, 2016 at 2:49 pm
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    It’s been going on far, far longer than that. I was working for Trinity between 2001-2005, the era of ‘Biggest to Best’ (immediately dubbed ‘Biggest to Bust), and there was plenty of blood on the floor then. It just seems to have continued ever since.

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  • May 31, 2016 at 12:43 pm
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    FRom the days when most P and M journalists could have commanded top jobs on a national how the mighty have fallen, mainly because management can’t manage except to put people with very little experience into top jobs, and even when they have failed, bring them back into another top job.. Can’t think of what the future might have in store – except perhaps a re-build job from Digby Jones!

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