In the blink of an eye, the media and tech jobs market has gone from hot to not. HR managers have gone from figuring out ways to lure employees to mass firings amid a general pull-back of ads tied to the declining economic outlook.
"The common wisdom is when the economic outlook turns bad, the very first thing to go is marketing and advertising," Andy Challenger, SVP at outplacement and executive coaching firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas, told Insider.
In all, 3,774 media jobs were lost in 2022, down 5% from the year before, according to Challenger, Gray & Christmas. This was down from an unprecedented 2020, though. In news alone, 1,808 jobs were cut in 2022, up 20% from 2021, according to the firm.
The cuts have hit companies of all stripes, from entertainment giants like Warner Bros. Discovery and Paramount Global which are racing to make their streaming businesses profitable to digital media companies such as BuzzFeed and Vice Media which are trying to bolster their valuations. Also affected were legacy journalism stalwarts like The Washington Post and USA Today owner Gannett, which laid off 400 staff and axed a further 400 positions in early December.
More job losses have come in 2023, including at Vimeo, which announced cuts of 11%, and Dow Jones, which is laying off less than 2% of staff at The Wall Street Journal, MarketWatch, and more divisions. Entertainment industry observers are watching for expected cuts at Disney, where a hiring freeze and other cost controls are already in effect.
"The hottest labor market in American history inevitably is going to cool a little bit," Challenger said.
Here are 17 media and entertainment companies that have laid off staff as of January 2023:
AMC Networks, the parent company of the cable network behind "The Walking Dead," "Mad Men," and "Breaking Bad," is laying off 20% of its 1,000 American staffers, or about 200 people, according to a report in the Wall Street Journal. Its CEO, Christina Spade, the former AMC CFO who was in the top position for just three months, is also exiting and is entitled to a cash severance payout of at least $10.5 million.
"It was our belief that cord-cutting losses would be offset by gains in streaming. This has not been the case," AMC company chairman James Dolan wrote in a note to network staffers in late November, the Journal reported. AMC Networks subsidiaries also include IFC, Sundance TV, and streaming services AMC+, Shudder, and Acorn TV.
BuzzFeed on December 6 laid off 12% of staff or 180 people, citing challenging economic conditions, opportunities to consolidate following its 2021 acquisition of Complex Networks, and a lag in monetizing the audience's shift to vertical video. The cuts focused on BuzzFeed and Complex, not HuffPost or BuzzFeed News, which had staff reductions in 2021 and earlier in 2022, respectively. "It's grim watching this happen to this company people really care about," one staffer told Insider.
BuzzFeed went public via a SPAC in late 2021 and its life as a public company has been rocky. Its stock price has plunged to below $1 and its first earnings call was marked by cuts to its workforce, a call for voluntary buyouts in its vaunted but money-losing news division, and the exit of three top editors. Looking ahead, the company said it was working to boost growth by ramping up its vertical video output and focusing on creator-driven content that has advertiser appeal.
Layoffs came on January 11 to Dow Jones, publisher of The Wall Street Journal, Barron's, MarketWatch, and others, with one knowledgeable source saying cuts would affect less than 2% of staff. IAPE, the union that represents Dow Jones employees, said the layoffs appear to be global, with employees in offices outside the US, including London and Barcelona, getting invitations to layoff meetings.
Media giant Gannett has spent the last few months making deep cuts to its fleet of newspapers, which includes flagship title USA Today as well as regional papers like The Indianapolis Star.
In August, the company cut 400 people and said it would not fill hundreds of open roles. Then this month, Gannett said it was cutting about 6% of its roughly 3,440-person media unit, or about 200 staffers. That news followed an announcement from Gannett CEO Mike Reed in October mandating unpaid leave as well as voluntary buyouts.
Gannett has been under pressure as it tries to shift its business from print to digital, but the crunch in the ad market has hit the publicly-traded newspaper company hard. Its stock has fallen more than 60 percent this year.
Digital media publisher G/O, which comprises 11 brands, laid off 11 people — or about 3% of its staff — in December. G/O formed in 2019 when private equity firm Great Hill Partners acquired the former Gawker Media sites including Gizmodo, Jezebel, and Kotaku. This past summer, G/O also acquired the business news site Quartz.
CEO Jim Spanfeller wrote in a memo to staff, reviewed by Insider, that the layoffs were spread across the company's legacy and newer properties and were meant to eliminate redundancies in roles following the Quartz acquisition. "In no way is this a reflection on these people or their talents and abilities. It is simply a reflection of the final stages of incorporating a new business with some amount of acceleration due to the economic headwinds every company is currently facing," he wrote.
Morning Brew, a millennial-focused media company that was acquired by Insider Inc. in 2020, laid off 14% of its staff of about 300 in November.
Cofounder and CEO Austin Rief wrote in an email to staff that "a lot of fear and uncertainty" is scaring marketers, and that Morning Brew has felt the effects of the ad environment. Those impacted included Daniel Bentley, a managing editor overseeing two newsletters at Morning Brew, "Sidekick" and "Money Scoop;" reporter Katie Canales, who had joined Morning Brew from Insider; reporter Sherry Qin; executive producer Brian Henry; and senior editor Stassa Edwards.
NBCUniversal started laying off ad salespeople in January after the company executed a buyout program across divisions offering early retirement to older employees.
The Comcast-owned giant was looking to keep costs under control in 2022, resulting in a cull that had impacted NBC Sports, E! Entertainment as well as NBC Group but was expected to hit much wider in January, according to senior insiders at the company. Bloomberg has reported that Comcast is looking for a billion dollars in cuts across the Philadelphia-based cable-to-satellite player.
Once a high-flying rocket ship, Netflix saw its wings clipped this year as the dominant streaming platform clocked subscriber losses and a subsequent hit to its share price. In the spring, the company slashed 450 full-time positions, then cut around 30 animation jobs and 70 animation contract roles.
The moves shook Netflix insiders, who noted a shift to "fear-based" decision-making among executives who were stretched thin. The streamer's subscriber figures have since rebounded, and the company is hiring in targeted areas such as gaming.
Outside Media, the enthusiast publisher of titles including Backpacker, Ski, and Climbing laid off 12% of its staff in November, mainly in content and journalism roles. Founder and CEO Robin Thurston cited slowing consumer appetite and a softening digital ad market. Thurston also conceded that the company expanded too rapidly during the pandemic, when it went on a shopping spree to capitalize on people's growing interest in the outdoors, and that some of the titles it bought were "extremely challenged." Outside previously laid off 15% of staff in May.
Paramount Global, under CEO Bob Bakish, has been trying to figure out how to integrate its premium cable offering, Showtime, with streamer Paramount+ and make savings at the same time. This quarter, Paramount axed an estimated 100 positions in marketing, international, and ad sales, according to Deadline.
Former Politico owner Robert Allbritton launched tech-focused web publication Protocol in early 2020, with the goal of making it the "ESPN of technology." But the outlet shuttered just two short years later and laid off a staff of more than 60 people amid a downturn in the industry that it covered, as Amazon, Meta and others also are letting go of thousands of staffers.
"I expected layoffs because of the economy, but the full shutdown was a surprise," one impacted staffer told Insider in November, shortly after the layoffs. Protocol faced steep competition from the likes of Wired and The Verge, and insiders said there was a sense that business had begun to slow in the second half of 2022.
Allbritton in 2021 sold Politico — and Protocol along with it — to Axel Springer, the parent company of Insider.
Recurrent Ventures was once a bright spot in the digital media industry, a new kid on the block buying up legacy media brands like Popular Science as well as digital standouts like MEL Magazine.
But in September, the private-equity-backed media company announced a round of layoffs, Insider first reported. Shortly thereafter, Recurrent's CEO and chief revenue officer both stepped aside. Alex Vargas, who joined the company in April as COO, stepped up as CEO in October.
The round of cuts — 52 people in total — followed Recurrent's decision in July to shutter MEL, the beloved men's lifestyle publication that it once hoped would be the backbone of a growing lifestyle division.
The company, which grew aggressively as it charted an acquisition-heavy strategy, cited market forces when it announced the layoffs. As Insider reported, disorganization in the ad sales department and an unclear strategy also led to low morale and a struggling business. Now, however, the company is ready to use its $300 million war chest — backed by private-equity giant Blackstone — to make more media deals in 2023.
After high hopes of expansion this year, Roku appeared to pause aspirations and ended the year making cuts. The company said that economic conditions meant that it would cut 200 of its 3,000 employees. CEO Anthony Wood, speaking on the company's third-quarter earnings call, said the holiday period was an unusual one this year in that advertisers who typically spent with the company were not spending with anyone.
Vice Media has quietly been trimming its staff this year as it faces a softening advertising environment and sale speculation, though talks with Greek broadcaster Antenna group have stalled, the Wall Street Journal reported. Vice expects to miss its 2022 revenue target by about $100 million, according to the Journal, which will likely depress the $1.5 billion valuation its seeking from a buyer.
In October, Vice laid off a handful of staffers at its games and tech verticals, Waypoint and Motherboard. In November, it laid off about a dozen editorial staffers out of a few hundred following an editorial reorg. Next came news of cuts at its food vertical Munchies and music destination Noisey. CEO Nancy Dubuc warned of more reductions, emailing in November that the company would look to reduce staff by 15%, citing ongoing cutbacks by brands and advertisers.
The once high-flying digital darling cofounded in 1994 by Shane Smith was valued at $5.7 billion at its 2017 peak but has struggled under the weight of massive debt payments to private equity giant TPG. CNBC reported in May that Vice hired bankers to explore a sale of all or parts of the company.
Vimeo is conducting a round of layoffs that will impact 11% of its workforce, CEO Anjali Sud wrote in a Jan. 4 email to staff.
"This was a very hard decision that impacts each of us deeply," Sud wrote. "It is also the right thing to do to enable Vimeo to be a more focused and successful company, operating with the necessary discipline in an uncertain economic environment."
Vimeo went public in May 2021 after spinning off from IAC. Its main business is software as a service that helps regular people create and distribute video content; it's been shifting its focus to serve big corporate clients like Gap, Nike, and Expedia and away from its role as a YouTube alternative.
The layoff follows a 6% trim in the workforce in July 2022.
The Washington Post will lay off a single-digit percentage of its workforce in early 2023 to set itself up for the future, publisher Fred Ryan told staff in a town hall in December. Ryan said the size of the newsroom wouldn't shrink as a result of the cuts; a spokesperson said the paper would invest in coverage, products, and people to serve its subscribers and reach new audiences. A video posted on Twitter captured staffers yelling at Ryan at the town hall.
The news followed the Post's announcement in November that it would shutter its standalone print Sunday magazine and eliminate 10 staff positions.
Sally Buzbee, the editor of the Post, told staffers in an email that the move was part of the paper's "global and digital transformation" and that the Post "will be shifting some of the most popular content, and adding more, in a revitalized Style section that will launch in the coming months," according to a Post story about the cuts.
Newspaper print magazines on Sunday are something of a dying breed — though The New York Times and Boston Globe still offer the product. The Post's magazine has been publishing in some form for over six decades, according to the story. After the layoffs, the union representing staffers at the paper hit back at the organization, saying, "There is no economic justification for layoffs in a year when The Post has hired a record number of new employees."
Perhaps no entertainment company has undergone as much corporate turmoil in 2022 as Warner Bros. Discovery, which is still digesting a megamerger that has combined WarnerMedia's HBO, HBO Max, CNN, and DC with Discovery's HGTV, Food Network, and other cable networks.
As CEO David Zaslav looks for at least $3 billion in synergies, the company, which employs some 40,000 people worldwide, is shedding staff from nearly every major division. CNN has cut 400 positions including open job roles, on top of another 239 cuts following the short life of the news streaming platform CNN+. At Turner Sports and Bleacher Report, 70 people have lost their jobs, while WBD has axed 100 in ad sales as that division shrinks by 30% globally.
Even at crown jewel HBO, Zas trimmed headcount by 14%, or about 70 people, over the summer, scrapping HBO Max's original unscripted team and yanking a plethora of titles from the streaming platform.