A daily-turned-weekly paper has announced it is selling up and moving to new offices, just days after its sister title’s HQ went on the market for nearly £400,000.
The Scarborough News office in Aberdeen Walk is set to be sold off and staff moved elsewhere in the town.
It is the latest in a series of office moves by Johnston Press titles.
Earlier this month, the News’s sister paper the Whitby’s Gazette’s historic offices in Whitby Harbour went on the market for £395,000.
Scarborough News editor Ed Asquith said: “The office is up for sale and we’re looking for other, higher quality premises in Scarborough to provide a better environment for staff.”
The paper’s editorial staff was reduced by around six in May 2012 when it switched from daily to weekly publication.
The Gazette’s Grade II listed harbourside offices are being offered for sale by agents Richardson & Smith and Gazette staff are likely to be based at a smaller building elsewhere in the town.
Ed is now the editor of both papers, after former Gazette editor Jon Stokoe was made redundant by publishers Johnston Press earlier this year.
Other recent JP office moves have seen the West Sussex County Times and its sister titles the West Sussex Gazette and Horsham Weekend Herald move to new “state-of-the-art” offices in Horsham.
And the Derbyshire Times recently moved out of its historic Station Road home on 22 March after 100 years of publishing and is now based at the Spire Walk development.
The current offices of the Scarborough News, which have gone on sale. (Picture: Google Maps)
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I would put a lot of money on the rumour that, in a few weeks’ time, they will announce they can’t find anywhere suitable, so staff will be working from Leeds or Sunderland ‘temporarily’ while the search continues – and in five years they’ll still be there.
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@Charles. It’s not like the Yorkshire Post building in Leeds is sat there half empty….. oh wait, yes it is.
I think your bet on Leeds may just come in for you. Isn’t the Hartlepool Mail’s staff based out of Sunderland as well?
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To be fair to JP, talk of moving from Aberdeen Walk goes back to my time there in the early nineties (and in those days we had a press on site too). It’s a wonderful old building full of memories going back more than a century. Will always be a major part of my life and memories, including climbing up the back wall and over the roof to get to my office on more than one occasion when I forgot my key but time moves on and as long as Charles’ fears (above) aren’t realised then it’s probably a good move for the staff.
If the old offices do close, hopefully there will be a farewell party and a reunion to say goodbye to the place – a far happier event than when some of us last got together to say farewell to Ian Laws.
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The one thing they are not doing is moving to “provide a better environment for staff.”
They are cashing in on a prime town centre location.
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A bad move. Readers of the Scarborough News know the historic building and can easily drop in as it’s in such a prime location. It’s good to know where your news is coming from. If JP do as they did with YP/EP they’ll end up in a faceless office where it is difficult for readers to visit. Rumour has it JP in Leeds has rented more floorspace there.
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I think Canute has it right in all reality.JP are probably now looking at an industrial estate in Eastfield to house both Whitby and Scarborough staff.
Shame about Aberdeen Walk. Scarborough is full of weird and wonderful characters, some of whom would regularly call into the office when I worked there – and with the occasional story too! Moving out from these city centre locations invariably means you miss out on talking to some of these characters.
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Same with the Brifhton Argus,seven months to get out due to the building being sold and we have as yet nowhere to go! We also have the added worry of it possibly changing from a daily that sells just over 15k a day to a weekly hopefully selling over 60k
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Good luck with that Pj
I think the conventional wisdom re daily to weekly is your biggest day plus 10% then steady decline.
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I’ll take that bet, Charles. Twenty quid?
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