BuzzFeed will lay off roughly 12 percent of its staff in a measure to cut costs, it said in a regulatory filing on Tuesday. The changes will take effect by the first quarter of 2023, and it comes nine months after the company bought out most of its news section in a sweeping penny-pinching move. “Our revenues are being impacted by a combination of worsening macroeconomic conditions, and the ongoing audience shift to vertical video, which is still developing from a monetization standpoint. That requires us to lower our costs,” CEO Jonah Peretti wrote in a staff memo. “Unfortunately, reducing our workforce is an essential part of cost cutting. Staff salaries are the single largest cost at the company.” Affected employees will receive a severance package, according to the U.S. Securities and Exchanges Commission filing. BuzzFeed’s layoffs reflect an increasingly hamstrung media landscape squeezed by a tightening economy. CNN, Gannett, and The Washington Post all enacted heavy layoffs earlier this month, and NPR said it would impose a hiring freeze and seek to cut $10 million by September next year.
