New Holland makes 15% redundant

New Holland Publishing has made seven staff members redundant, and frozen one additional post, as the downturn bites UK publishing.

The redundancies, across the sales, marketing and editorial departments, represent 15% of its workforce. New Holland is an illustrated and non-fiction publisher, and a subsidiary of New Holland Publishing South Africa.

The move is described as part of a major tightening of operating expenses. Managing director Steve Connolly said that 2008 had been a difficult year for New Holland due to the absence of a fully staffed rights team in late 2007 and early 2008, but that the situation had worsened in recent months "as UK sales, despite their excellent start to the year, started to slip".

He added that the redundancies were "traumatic" for everyone, given New Holland's medium size and "family-like" environment. Connolly succeeded the long-standing m.d. John Beaufoy at the beginning of the year.

The development is further evidence that UK publishers could be set to follow the lead of US publishers after last week’s "Black Wednesday" in the US, when five publishers announced either job cuts or salary freezes in the space of just 24 hours. This month has also seen redundancies at Lion Hudson and Anova.