Commercial printer Quad/Graphics is reducing its production capacity to better match declining print demand and, as a result, will eliminate 5.6% of its domestic work force.
Print demand has softened due to the economy, according to the company. As a result, Quad/Graphics is eliminating approximately 550 jobs at nine printing plants in five states across both production and administrative positions. The cuts will be completed this week.
“From consumer spending to housing and everywhere in-between, the world needs to go through a capacity reset,” said Joel Quadracci, Quad/Graphics’ president and CEO, in a statement. “There is simply too much of everything chasing too little demand. The printing industry is no different. There needs to be an industrywide reduction in capacity.
“While I had hoped to see some better indicators as we entered the New Year, it’s clear that this economic downturn is going to be much longer and more severe than we expected, and so we are taking appropriate and prudent steps to reset our own capacity,” he said.
The reduction is simply removing redundant capacity throughout its network of plants and would not impact the work it does for its clients, Quadracci said.
