Calling it the “right moment,” Postmedia Network’s chief operating officer Wayne Parrish is leaving the Toronto-based media company. His final day is June 30.
Parrish joined the company in 2010 as chief transformation officer, and has spent the past three-and-a-half years as COO – during which time the company has undergone what president and CEO Paul Godfrey described as a “fundamental transformation” from a traditional newspaper company to a multi-platform media company.
Parrish also oversaw the company’s recent acquisition of the Sun Media brands.
“This is a challenging but also exhilarating time for our industry,” said Parrish in an announcement. “We’ve achieved several significant goals, have a strong team in place, and with the Sun Media acquisition complete, it’s the right moment for me to take advantage of other opportunities.”
Postmedia said that operational matters would be handled by its executive team as it undertakes a review of its organizational structure.
The veteran executive’s departure comes on the heels of a report in The Globe and Mail stating that the company is looking for people to take voluntary buyouts at its Pacific Newspaper Group (PNG), which is comprised of the Vancouver Sun and The Province.
In an internal memo to staff obtained by the Globe, PNG president Gord Fisher said that “persistent challenges” to its business have necessitated the implementation of another voluntary buyout program.
Fisher told staff that national advertising revenues continue to drop “and we have yet to see the bright light at the end of that tunnel. To assume our job is to patiently wait for its return is a head-in-the-sand approach we must not take.”
He said the launch of new digital products across the Postmedia network have failed to “close the gap” in revenue. He said that the company has managed to reduce what he called “dramatic declines” in local print advertising, but the positives fail to outweigh the overall declines.
“The reality is, regardless of the exact mix of digital, print and subscription revenue we need to survive, there is only one path for us to follow in the immediate term,” he said. “And that is, as I have reinforced in all of my communications, we must continue to become a more efficient operation.”
Postmedia’s print advertising revenue fell 16% to $75.5 million in the three months ended Feb. 28, with management noting in its analysis that it expects the shift of ad dollars to digital to be permanent.
