Buyout or we will sell, Star-Ledger warns

By JEREMY HERRON
AP Business Writer
NEW YORK (AP) Advance Publications Inc. (which owns the Plain Dealer) will sell The
Star-Ledger of Newark unless 26 percent of staff accept buyouts by October, the company told employees in a letter Thursday.

Star-Ledger publisher George Arwady said that if 200 of the paper’s 750 full-time employees do not apply for a buyout by Oct. 1, and if the company does not get new agreements from unions representing its mailers and drivers, the New Jersey paper will be sold.

Advance will also sell sister paper The Times of Trenton unless 25 staff accept buyouts, thepaper's publisher, Richard Bilotti, said in a separate letter to staff.

It is unclear how many people work at the smaller paper in the New Jersey capital.

"Athough we have implemented a variety of plans to reduce expenses and create new sources of revenue, our financial picture continues to deteriorate. We simply have been unable to offset the
unprecedented and continuing steep decline in advertising revenue," Arwady said in the letter sent to staff.

He said the paper had already retained JPMorgan Chase to “help us plan a sale.

Advance Publications said earlier this week it will close its Newhouse News Service in Washington in November.

Advance, controlled by the Newhouse family, owns 26 daily newspapers, including The Oregonian in Portland, Ore.; The Plain Dealer in Cleveland and The Times-Picayune in New Orleans. It also owns Conde Nast Publications, the second-biggest magazine publisher in the country.