Ten more newspapers are to be closed by a regional publisher after they were deemed to be no longer economically viable.
JPIMedia has confirmed a series of title closures across the UK are to take place in the coming days and weeks – following recent revelations that The Buteman, Bucks Advertiser and Thame Gazette will cease publication this week.
Those set for closure include paid-for weeklies the Morley Observer and Advertiser, Epworth Bells, Tyrone Times, Hawick News and Selkirk Weekend Advertiser.
Also set to cease publication are free titles the Worthing Advertiser, Glasgow South and Eastwood Extra, Hayling Islander, Portsmouth View and Wharfe Valley Times.
Meanwhile the Burnley Express is to move from bi-weekly to weekly publication on a Friday with the current Tuesday edition axed.
JPIMedia says no jobs will be lost as a reasult of the closures.
A JPIMedia spokesperson said: “The decision to close these titles has not been taken lightly, but it is crucial that we focus all our efforts on the long-term stability of the business and deliver newspapers and websites which can sustain our business for the long term.
“We would like to thank all our readers and advertisers for their support through the decades, and we hope they will understand why we have made this decision in these challenging times.
“We can also confirm that no jobs will be impacted by the closures.”
The Hawick News has faced a challenge in recent years from its former editor Jason Marshall, who had founded his own hyperlocal venture the Hawick Paper in 2016 after taking voluntary redundancy from JPIMedia forerunner Johnston Press.
On Friday Argyll Media announced it was launching the Isle of Bute News on 21 June following the closure of The Buteman.
Last month it was reported JPIMedia was sounding out advisers about launching an auction of parts or all of the business.
However, the company responded to the speculation by saying “nothing has been decided”.
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Quelle Surprise (at this stage).
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“Last month it was reported JPIMedia was sounding out advisers about launching an auction of parts or all of the business.”
I’ll buy that for a dollar.
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This is just the beginning. Jp/JPI have under resourced local weeklies and basically driven them into the ground. They will of course blame everything except their own mis-management. They know as much about newspapers as I know about nuclear physics. No jobs will be affected because the few staff left are multi-tasking and working way off patch for 2-3 papers. It’s a case of lions being led by donkeys!
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According to Facebook there seem to be job losses down south at Horsham Sussex centre, seven I think, though not sure if paper closures.
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I know many many people who have stopped buying the local paper 1/ because it has so little local content and 2/ because they can read the main stories on the dismal JPI website for free during the following week. That is the absurd level of management at JPI that creates free competition for its own papers whilst filling half the paper with generic non local content pages. There are virtually NO local ads on the site. Their UGC policy obviously isn’t working either as they had to close the Buteman after failing to get readers to send stories. What a bunch of idiots. It wasn’t broken but JP/JPI broke it.
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@paperboy Some very long serving people gone in the south. Looks like sport has also been hit in terms of staffing
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The fact no job losses are expected probably tells you everything you need to know about why these newspapers are failing.
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Ten titles closed but no job losses?
Goes to show how understaffed and unloved those titles must be.
Closures on this scale present golden opportunities to budding entrepreneurs to launch new hyper local titles in areas now abandoned by the bigger groups who’ve all but turned their backs on community print publishing.
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JPIMedia now stands for JPIdiocy Media.
Funny how a few years ago they axed the free Portsmouth weekly The Journal, then began the free Portsmouth View which lasted just over five years. Sister-paper the Gosport & Fareham View bit the dust a couple of weeks ago as well. Reason? ‘We’ve run out of money’. Biggest blow has been the Hayling Islander. The locals distributed for free plus contributed articles for free. It’ll be missed. No job losses…true…simply because they were tagged on to normal work at Portsmouth’s ‘Big City’ daily The News and were monthly publications.
The good news about this whole story is that JPI must have decided to cut costs so they can pay us back the 10% we lost from our old final salary pensions when JP went into lightning-fast admin late last year ? ?
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thanks Richard Weston.To think the JP papers in south used to be the money spinners. Now brought to their knees by chasing the crock of gold that is not there…digital.
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