A world of troubles at Canadian Geographic
People in the business have always looked up to Canadian Geographic, as a robust mid-sized title in a country with few of them, as an excellent and prize-winning magazine and as a real publishing success story.
Hence the dismay and puzzlement when, last Friday (September 1), seven people, including a couple of senior and longtime employees, were abruptly terminated Among them were Ian McKelvie, Senior Marketing Manager, Margaret Williamson, Photo Editor and Caroline Milano, Coordinator Society Programs. The others were: Jodi Di Menna,Assistant Editor; John Burridge, Production Artist; Tobi McIntyre, New Media Coordinator; and Celine Parisien, Art Director, Special Projects and Promotions.
The story of how, 12 years ago, Michael De Pencier and Key Publishers took a 50% stake in Canadian Geographic Enterprises (with the Royal Canadian Geographic Society) and helped turn the magazine around has taken on an almost mythic quality. It has been held up as a model for how certain specialty titles can thrive under a foundation structure. Can Geo has an audited circulation of 210,000 and a readership of almost 4 million and an apparently robust merchandising arm.
About four months ago a number of people, mostly contract employees, were let go, but assurances were given to staff, and outsiders, that this was a minor business adjustment.
Mere months after John Thomson announced he was leaving as Publisher to work on a new project with Key Publishers (who recently sold their 50% interest in CGE), the new publisher apparently felt that he had no choice but to cut staff drastically, including long-term employees.
Thomson, who is a past Chair of Magazines Canada, had been spending a good deal of his time away from Can Geo in the past year, working on several new CGE projects , including one called the BC Experience.
When Key announced that it wanted to sell its 50% interest, André Préfontaine, lately the President of Transcontinental Media, was hired as a consultant, helping CGE to find a sympathetic partner. When a partner acceptable to the Society board could not be found, the directors decided to buy the 50% back themselves and offered the publisher's job to Préfontaine. Once the purchase and sale of the 50% was formally closed, the seven staff were terminated.
Hence the dismay and puzzlement when, last Friday (September 1), seven people, including a couple of senior and longtime employees, were abruptly terminated Among them were Ian McKelvie, Senior Marketing Manager, Margaret Williamson, Photo Editor and Caroline Milano, Coordinator Society Programs. The others were: Jodi Di Menna,Assistant Editor; John Burridge, Production Artist; Tobi McIntyre, New Media Coordinator; and Celine Parisien, Art Director, Special Projects and Promotions.
The story of how, 12 years ago, Michael De Pencier and Key Publishers took a 50% stake in Canadian Geographic Enterprises (with the Royal Canadian Geographic Society) and helped turn the magazine around has taken on an almost mythic quality. It has been held up as a model for how certain specialty titles can thrive under a foundation structure. Can Geo has an audited circulation of 210,000 and a readership of almost 4 million and an apparently robust merchandising arm.
About four months ago a number of people, mostly contract employees, were let go, but assurances were given to staff, and outsiders, that this was a minor business adjustment.
Mere months after John Thomson announced he was leaving as Publisher to work on a new project with Key Publishers (who recently sold their 50% interest in CGE), the new publisher apparently felt that he had no choice but to cut staff drastically, including long-term employees.
Thomson, who is a past Chair of Magazines Canada, had been spending a good deal of his time away from Can Geo in the past year, working on several new CGE projects , including one called the BC Experience.
When Key announced that it wanted to sell its 50% interest, André Préfontaine, lately the President of Transcontinental Media, was hired as a consultant, helping CGE to find a sympathetic partner. When a partner acceptable to the Society board could not be found, the directors decided to buy the 50% back themselves and offered the publisher's job to Préfontaine. Once the purchase and sale of the 50% was formally closed, the seven staff were terminated.
Labels: Canadian Geographic
posted by D. B. Scott at
9:31 pm
2 Comments:
Oh, but there is so much more to this story. I encourage reporters to dig deeper on this issue...
If there is more to this story, it is certainly being kept well under wraps, since yours is the first comment since the item was published. This blog doesn't have the resources to do investigative reporting; we generally need tips from insiders in order to report most things, though we check them out first.
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