A regional daily newspaper in the Midlands is to move offices next month with its home for the past 55 years set to go under the bulldozer.
The Coventry Telegraph is leaving its headquarters at 157 Corporation Street as owners Trinity Mirror seek to sell the land for redevelopment.
The newspaper is to move to as as-yet-undisclosed new location in the canal basin area of the city centre, within walking distance of the current building.
Its existing offices, which are attached to a now-disused printing plant, are likely to be knocked down as part of a comprehensive redevelopment scheme.
Trinity Mirror first submitted a planning application to redevelop the site in 2010.
The background to the move is set out in a report to Coventry City Council by property agents Montagu Evans which accompanied the application.
It stated: “The development proposals arise as the current premises are surplus to the requirements of Trinity Mirror Group and are unsuitable for their continued occupation.
“Trinity Mirror Group’s intention is to seek replacement office space and retain current staffing levels within Coventry City Centre.
“At its height, the Coventry Evening Telegraph used to employ approximately 300 people on site. The newspaper now employs approximately 110 people.
“The main building on the Western Site Area was originally designed to accommodate printing works within the basements which are now redundant as newspaper printing is now undertaken off site.
“Clearly the scale and function of the building no longer matches the requirements for the production of a newspaper some 50 years after the building was originally constructed.
“The buildings are old, unattractive and are in poor condition.”
The newspaper, which was founded as the Midland Daily Telegraph in 1891, moved into the Corporation Street premises in November 1957.
Its then proprietor Lord Iliffe, whose family still own a number of regional newspapers, laid the foundation stone of the building.
A Trinity Mirror spokesman said: “The Coventry Telegraph is moving offices next month to premises in Coventry about five minutes walk from where they currently are.”
The site is likely to be redeveloped as shops, offices and an hotel.
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I began my journalistic career in that building in the 1980s, when the reporting team included Jeremy Vine, Rob Irvine, Rob Stokes and John Meehan. The paper sold more than 90,000 copies a day, had branch offices in Stratford, Rugby, Daventry, Nuneaton, Leamington, a sports ground at Lythalls Lane and was flourishing, largely due to the management. The MD Frank Bunting may have been an accountant by profession but he was a newspaper man through and through. Staff numbers were about 450 then.
This is another sad day in the decline of a once-great title. And the Canal Basin may be just five minutes walk, but it is further away from the city centre, parking and bus services. Will people who want to place adverts really bother now, when its present location was so easy to get to?
Only 110 people working there? Rugby, Daventry and Stratford offices long closed. Saving a fortune in wages and rents and leases, but still Trinity Mirror can’t make a profit, unlike before it stepped in.
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Trinity-Mirror is selling the family silver everywhere it can. Any property assets which can be cashed in are up for grabs… which would make some sense if the economy wasn’t in the middle of a recession. Selling at the bottom of the market reflects their desperation.
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I hope John Mutton’s mob at Coventry City Council get the building listed. It will stick two fingers up to TM, bunch of charlatans.
PS. Will have to come up with a new name now the peroxide blonde is leaving.
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And I hope that the ghosts of Keith Whetstone, John Cross and so many other fine reporters give TM sleepless nights. A classy building it was in the 70s, with a superb team. A great shame.
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