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N.Y. Daily News hit with layoffs reducing editorial staff by half

The New York Daily News has had its editorial staff cut in half after layoffs announced Monday by publisher Tronc.

Among the employees departing are editor-in-chief Jim Rich and managing editor Kristen Lee. Robert York, currently the editor at Tronc-owned The Morning Call in Allentown, Pennsylvania, will become the new editor-in-chief July 30, employees learned from an email sent by the Chicago-based media company.

Tronc, which also owns the Chicago Tribune, The Baltimore Sun and Orlando Sentinel, acquired the Daily News last year for one dollar. The tabloid, founded in 1919, faced “significant financial challenges,” said the Tronc email to employees.

As a result, the Daily News would see its editorial team reduced by 50 percent and coverage would refocused on “breaking news–especially in areas of crime, civil justice and public responsibility,” employees were told.

New York Daily News staff reporter Chelsia Rose Marcius cries as she is hugged by staff photographer Todd Maisel after they were both laid off, Monday, July 23, 2018, in New York. The tabloid will cut half of its newsroom staff, saying it wants to focus more on digital news. (AP Photo/Mark Lennihan)

The Daily News, which once had hundreds of staffers had already been reduced to 75 to 100, according to The New York Times. The New York Post put the Daily News’ current staff at 85.

“The decisions being announced today reflects the realities of our business and the need to adapt an ever-changing media environment,” the email sent to employees said. “They are not a reflection on the significant talent that is leaving today. Let there be no doubt: these colleagues are highly valued and will be missed.”

The news led to an outpouring of concern. New York Governor Andrew Cuomo encouraged Tronc to reconsider the layoffs and offered state help to keep its staff intact in a note posted to Twitter. “This will undoubtedly devastate many households and hurt an important New York institution and one of our nation’s journalism giants,” he said.

 

Continue reading:   https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/media/2018/07/23/n-y-daily-news-hit-layoffs-reducing-editorial-staff-half/819634002/

An unlikely company has the most to gain if Sears closes all its stores

Sears’ business is declining so rapidly that Wall Street analysts are now betting on who stands to win if the company closes all of its stores.

In that scenario, the retailer with the most to gain is Best Buy, according to a new analysis by UBS.

Best Buy might seem like an unlikely winner if Sears disappears. It’s best known for selling electronics, whereas Sears’ main businesses are apparel and appliances.

But Best Buy has been aggressively expanding its share of the appliance market in recent years. Thanks to that increasing emphasis on appliances, as well as its proximity to existing Sears and Kmart stores, Best Buy would get the biggest lift in same-store sales if all Sears stores closed, analysts found.

Mandatory Credit: Photo by Oleksiy Maksymenko/imageBROK/REX/Shutterstock (4720435a) People entering Sears store, Yorkdale Shopping Centre, Toronto, Canada, Northern America VARIOUS

Home Depot and Lowe’s would also get a huge boost in appliance sales from the demise of Sears. Together, Best Buy, Home Depot, and Lowe’s would capture about 80% of Sears’ appliance business if all its stores closed, analysts said.

Amazon is missing from that list — even though Sears is now selling its Kenmore appliances through Amazon — because shoppers still prefer to buy appliances in physical stores, according to the analysts.

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Papa John Loses Dough: Pizza Chain Founder Loses $70 Million In Hours, Blames NFL

Papa John is having a bad day.

The net worth of John Schnatter, founder and CEO of pizza chain Papa John’s, fell $70 million in less than 24 hours after the company released its third-quarter financial report on Tuesday afternoon. The business beat estimates on earnings and revenue, but it lowered guidance on same-store sales for the coming period.

Investors were not pleased with that news and sent shares down 11% through 12:30 pm Eastern Time on Wednesday. The stock is now trading at just over $60 per share.

One casualty of the slide was Schnatter’s personal fortune. The 55-year-old—who owns roughly 25% of Papa John’s—is now worth $801 million, Forbes estimates.

Schnatter blames part of the downturn on the National Football League, which has faced turbulence amid widespread national anthem protests in the past year. “The NFL has hurt us by not resolving the current debacle,” he said on a conference call on Wednesday. Papa John’s is the league’s official pizza sponsor.

So far 2017 has been a challenging year for the restaurant chain. It has lost a quarter of its market capitalization since the start of January. Its future looked significantly brighter earlier this year. Shares hit an all-time high in December 2016, and Schnatter made Forbes’ list of the World’s Billionaires for the first time in March. He has since fallen off the ranks.

Schnatter, a native of Indiana, built his business from scratch. After graduating from college in 1983, he started working at his father’s tavern, then on the brink of bankruptcy. He sold his car, a 1971 Camaro Z28, to pay off debts and to buy used pizza equipment, which he installed in a broom closet at his father’s bar.

After righting the finances at the bar, Schnatter opened his first Papa John’s in Jeffersonville, Indiana in 1985. Growth came quickly; within six years he had 100 locations. The company now boasts more than 5,000 restaurants in 45 countries and territories.

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