On Wednesday, National Geographic magazine laid off its last remaining staff writers in the latest of The Walt Disney Company’s cutbacks, according to The Washington Post.
- The layoffs include 19 editorial staffers who had been notified of the decision back in April.
- The world famous magazine will continue to be published, with articles coming from freelancers or being pieced together by editors.
- Additional cost-cutting measures for the magazine include the curtailing of photo contracts that enabled photographers to capture the iconic images for which the magazine has been know, as well as the removal of the magazine from newsstands in the United States starting next year.
- The magazine’s small audio department has also been eliminated.
- The move doesn’t come as a hug surprise as National Geographic magazine has been suffering from the long decline of print media in favor of digital news and information.
- The magazine reached its peak in the late 1980s, when it had 12 million subscribers in the United States, and millions more overseas.
- At the end of 2022, it just just under 1.8 million subscribers, and was still one of the most widely read magazines in the world.
- Among those impacted by the layoffs was Debra Adams Simmons, who was recently promoted to vice president of diversity, equity and inclusion at National Geographic Media, which oversees both the magazine and website.
- Chris Albert, a spokesperson from National Geographic, told the Washington Post via email that the cuts do not change the company’s plans to continue publishing a monthly magazine, “but rather give us more flexibility to tell different stories and meet our audiences where they are across our many platforms.”