How much are you likely to lose turning your newspaper into an all-singing multiplatform news outlet? £9.8 million in the second year if you’re Telegraph Media Group. Results found at Companies House for (via Times) show that’s how much the publisher’s losses shrunk to in 2006 after recording a mammoth £30.7 million 2005 loss whilst moving to a Victoria news hub kitted out to produce podcasts, TV, blogs, rolling news and, oh yeah, a newspaper.
FT.com: “Laying off staff and costs associated with merging the print and online output of the newspapers added an exceptional item of £21.9 million compared with £45.8 million for 2005, when there were also redundancies.” But while the relocation costs shrunk from £32.2 million to £2.3 million, staff restructuring continued – costs for redundancies and reorganisation grew from 2005’s £13.6 million to 2006’s £19.6 million. The group now has an average 1,012 staff compared with 1,071 the previous year. It’s for that reason some journalists may still have ants in its pants – they meet tomorrow to discuss transitioning to seven-day operation.
Overall group revenue was £449.7 million, up two percent. Times: “According to a separate set of accounts, profit at the Telegraph titles, taken in isolation and with interest and restructuring charges stripped out, showed that income was £32.7 million, down by three percent, with profit margins down from 10.4 percent to 9.6 percent.”