DALLAS — The owner of NewsNation, WGN Radio, and the largest collection of broadcast television stations in the U.S. has confirmed that it is moving ahead with a reduction-in-force initiative.
This move comes after a similar employee trimming move at The CW, which Nexstar Media Group controls.
In a statement provided to RBR+TVBR, a Nexstar spokesperson explained, “Our broadcasting and sales divisions are streamlining their organizations to reduce our operating expenses and accelerate collaboration across the company.”
The statement continued, “While it is difficult to make these sorts of changes, they will impact less than 2% of our workforce and allow us to focus on areas of growth for our viewers, partners, and customers.”
Nexstar’s statement concluded by noting the publicly traded company, which enjoys the highest stock valuation in its sector (minus American Tower Corp.), by saying it is “committed to managing through this period of unprecedented change in the media industry so that Nexstar continues to thrive for years to come.”
Nexstar is hardly the only broadcast media company experiencing radical change, and budgetary pressures, as it navigates through an environment in which ATSC 3.0 build-out costs, newsroom expansion and core advertising struggles have tempered record political advertising and a retransmission consent scheme that many believe will come to a halt in just five years. The E.W. Scripps Co. is also undergoing an extreme makeover, with its local news teams evolving to meet today’s challenges as its Scripps News operation goes to an app-delivered and connected TV approach amid executive shifts and departures.
At The CW, some 24 positions in the public relations and scripted programming divisions were eliminated in November, The Wrap reports; the publication first shared the news of Nexstar’s 2% employee reduction plan.
In pre-market trading on Thursday, NXST was trading at $165.49, up 1.16% from December 11. Nexstar shares trade on the Nasdaq market.
