Trinity Mirror rings in the changes

Posted by Helena Humphrey on October 21, 2009 at 12:02 PM

In less than one months time, the daily edition of the Birmingham Post will be a thing of the past, with its weekly edition set to roll off the printers every Thursday from 12 November, the Guardian has reported.

Last year the business paper underwent a revamp, switching from a broadsheet format to a tabloid, and moving with the Birmingham Mail and about 40 other Trinity Mirror daily and weekly titles into a brand new multimedia newsroom.

Yet this did little to help Trinity Mirror crawl out of its £388m debt, which has since caused the company to cut 1,200 jobs, close 27 newspapers, and sell four titles.

Alongside the 152-year-old daily newspaper's transformation into a weekly, the Birmingham Mail - currently an afternoon paper - is set to become an overnight morning title, as of next year.

The Post will retain its tabloid format and add two to four regular supplements. With a circulation down to 12,076 according to the most recent ABC figures, the Post was always a likely candidate for a change of frequency.

The news has caused a considerable staff shake-up: For a start approximately 80 further redundancies are expected across the group. Although no secret was made of the on-going review and consultation process, the news was still a heavy blow and described as "savage" by the National Union of Journalists.

As regards the editors, Post editor Marc Reeves is to depart at the end of the year - but has agreed to stay on to oversee the transformation period and website revamp, which, according to Reeves, will involve a brand new digital edition of the paper "delivered by email directly to your inbox every morning for you to scan at your screen, on your phone, your PDA - or even to print off and read in the old-fashioned way."

The Mail's editor of just over three years, Steve Dyson, has also announced his departure but not yet set a date. His successor, Dave Brookes, is currently editor of the group's Coventry Telegraph -and will also perform the role of editor-in-chief for the whole Fort Dunlop operation.

The other significant change will be the way in which the papers are produced; the current three-step down process will be whittled down to just two, employing the use of templates more frequently and thus negating the role of sub-editors.

Due to a collapse in classified car, home and jobs advertising revenue, the regional newspaper industry is riding out a nightmare of year. One media industry analyst, Claire Enders, told a committee of MPs in June that up to half the UK's 1,300 local and regional papers could close by 2014.

Trinity Mirror - and all publishers - are clearly set on cutting back costs in order to try to safeguard the future of print during the worst advertising downturn in recent history. The big question now however, with these ruthless cutbacks be a one off for the industry ... or will others follow where Trinity and GMG have paved the way?

Source: Guardian