American news website Buzzfeed News, published by Buzzfeed is not able to bring in any profits and is set to shut down. In an email shared to its staff, BuzFeed CEO Jonah Peretti said the move tied in with a 15% workforce reduction across several teams.
“While layoffs are occurring across nearly every division, we’ve determined that the company can no longer continue to fund BuzzFeed News as a standalone organization,” he wrote.
According to Peretti, he admitted to having overinvested in BuzzFeed News “because I love their work and mission so much.”
“This made me slow to accept that the big platforms wouldn’t provide the distribution or financial support required to support premium, free journalism purpose-built for social media,” he wrote.
Peretti also pointed towards possible job roles at Huff Post’s digital website that BuzzFeed had acquired from a 2020 deal.
“HuffPost and BuzzFeed Dot Com have signaled that they will open a number of select roles for members of BuzzFeed News,” Peretti told employees. “These roles will be aligned with those divisions’ business goals and match the skills and strengths of many of BuzzFeed News’s editors and reporters.”
Peretti continued sharing his regrets in not holding the company “to higher standards for profitability, to give us the buffer needed to manage through economic industry downturns and avoid painful days like today.”
He also indicated that some big positions in the company will also be leaving the company, including Chief Revenue Officer Edgar Hernandez, and Chief Operating Offier Christian Baesler, with President Marcela Martin would be taking on the responsibility for all revenue functions.
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