The restructuring will also lead to operational efficiencies and will result in an overall reduction of 28 full-time and 9 part-time content staffers – or 21 percent of the overall content operation's full-time employees, according to NOLA Media Group President Ricky Mathews. Despite the reduction, the remaining 118 full-time journalists on staff as well as more than 50 correspondents covering news, sports, entertainment, food and dining and neighborhood news across metropolitan New Orleans, make NOLA.com | The Times-Picayune by far the largest news-gathering force in the New Orleans region, Mathews said.
"It's a difficult day for us and our colleagues who are losing their jobs," said Mathews. "We wish them the very best. Aligning our costs with the business realities faced by media organizations around the country is a tough challenge. But it's also important for our readers to know that we remain the largest and most experienced news staff, and the most widely read newspaper and website in the area."
The company also recently announced that it is creating and staffing a New Orleans area facility to design and produce the pages of The Times-Picayune and its four sister newspapers in Alabama and Mississippi. The new print lab will be completed later this year and will be housed in The Times-Picayune's former East Jefferson bureau along Interstate 10 in Metairie.
Over the past three years, NOLA.com has increased its average daily readership by 74 percent and reaches more than 700,000 followers on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram through its social media channels, Mathews said. Moreover, 71 percent of NOLA.com readers now get their news and information from smartphones and tablets – up from 29 percent in August of 2012. During the same period, the audience for video has increased 350 percent, he said.
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