Newspaper & Mailroom
Sun-Times Media Group Announces Plan to Consolidate Printing Operations
Monday 29. December 2008 - Media Company Says It Will Consolidate Company-Wide Print Operations; Company Says It Expects To Close Fox Valley Publications Production Facility In April 2009
Sun-Times Media Group, Inc. (OTCBB:SUTM) today announced its intention to consolidate its printing operations and that it tentatively plans to close its Fox Valley Publications production facility in suburban Plainfield, Illinois by April 2009. The Company intends to sell the facility. The Company anticipates that printing work performed at Fox Valley will be performed at the Company’s Ashland Avenue production plant. The Company estimates annual cost savings from the plant closure to exceed $3 million.
“Sun-Times Media Group continues to look for more efficient ways to run our businesses, particularly in this tough financial and economic environment as part of our previously announced plan to reduce annual costs by $45 million to $55 million over the next nine months,” said Cyrus Freidheim, President and Chief Executive Officer of Sun-Times Media Group, Inc. “We’ve taken a hard look at our fixed costs such as our printing plants. We have determined that we can efficiently print all of our products at our two remaining facilities, without sacrificing quality or output. These changes will not affect our customers or our products.”
The 100,000-square-foot Plainfield facility houses pre-print, editorial and administrative functions. The Plainfield plant currently prints editions of The Beacon News, The Herald News, The SouthtownStar, the Naperville Sun, other Sun newspapers and various weekly shoppers. At the time of the closing, some of the 153 employees located at the Plainfield facility will move to other locations, depending upon job function, and the Company anticipates there will be some positions at the Ashland production plant for employees currently performing press work at Fox Valley. The Company said there will be some headcount reductions.