Et Tu, Playboy? Hugh Hefner Outsources Jobs, Preps For Layoffs

Playboy magazine is not the cultural touchstone it once was and is on track to lose $8 million this year. To counteract such disappointing numbers, the company has decided to outsource all of its publishing jobs, excluding only editorial, to generically named American Media Inc., according to a report from Reuters.

Apparently all of the things the magazine is good for are available for free online. Except killer investigative journalism! But it’s not the 1970s anymore, that much is certain.

Florida-based American Media, the fourth-largest U.S. magazine publisher, will take over production, circulation, advertising sales, marketing and support functions of both Playboy magazine and the company’s other domestic publications.

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The move will result in about 25 job cuts, leading to a fourth-quarter charge of $2 million, Playboy said, adding that some of the positions will be transferred to American Media.

Playboy Chief Executive Scott Flanders said the magazine would be profitable again by 2011, but hopefully, by then it will be someone else’s problem, as rumors are currently circulating that would have the company sold for around $300 million in the not so distant future. And to think, nudity once seemed so recession-proof.

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