bookpublishing

Although I came to work in a happy, productive mood, seeing senior management run off to emergency meetings got me worried. Then the whispering started. And then a few people were packing up their stuff, and it was suddenly clear what was going on: Layoffs.

There are rarely layoffs at my company so people were understandably shaken. Three project editors (at or near the same level as me) and five or six salespeople were let go. It’s not a tremendous number for a company of our size, but it was still significant. And it also means the rest of us need to step up our game.

The reason behind it all: Borders. If you’re reading this blog, you may already know that Borders (BGN) is in trouble–big trouble. If they’re not bought out soon, they may go under. They provided a few million dollars to our revenue, and suddenly, the profit we get from them is minimal because they aren’t buying much anymore. So to have a company like that go under and be unable to anticipate it is hurting a lot of publishers. I had been hearing about layoffs at other companies, so I figured it was only a matter of time before it happened here too. I’m sad to lose 3 project editors I work with a lot, some really great, hard-working colleagues. On the bright side, I’m about to take on many books from a new genre: local interest.

Is your company having trouble too? It doesn’t matter if you’re in publishing or not: feel free to share your story. We’ll have to keep hoping the economy turns around soon!

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