Some of those first 15 sound really good. The latter 7 are a bit scary, but we'll do what we have to do!

Thanks for talking about this and not leaving everyone to wonder and freak out like so many other companies are doing...

Does number 11 not seem a bit counter-productive? Would we not be doing what we hope our subscribers will not?

I'm glad to see the work-from-home idea as prominently positioned as it is. Working from home can cut down on overhead costs tremendously, reduce our environmental impact and, contrary to popular belief, even increase worker efficiency AND morale. See: http://www.wired.com/culture/culturereviews/magazine/16-10/st_essay

Thanks for posting ideas Bill. I'm sure we can weather this storm.

Count me in for #1, the one about working from home. Not only can this save money for the company it can also dramatically increase productivity for certain types of jobs and help retain talent.

Another idea which I know some companies are doing, and to some degree we may also be doing (but perhaps should be more aggressive about) is encouraging departments to inquire with vendors about discounts (especially if we can pay on delivery vs. waiting for the 30 day period to elapse as usually happens). In some cases vendors already have several accounts 90 days or more over due, and are willing to extend 5 - 10% discounts for upfront payment. That could account for some significant savings.

While I think eliminating the paper and styrofoam cups is a good idea, eliminating the coffee seems very counterproductive. Maybe I'm more addicted than most, but a caffeine boost in the morning sure helps me stay awake and focused.

On the other hand, ensuring that the lights are off on weekends seems like a no-brainer!

Many of these ideas are terrific, but I would really hesitate about reducing or eliminating the tuition reimbursement plan. I think that would be "penny wise and pound foolish" as it would remove a strong incentive that helps us retain some of our best employees -- and benefit from their increased knowledge and skill sets. We run the risk of losing our most motivated employees, and reducing the ROI we receive for from them, both short and long term.

And Christian Georgeou's suggestion about early payment discounts could be a gem - my oil company does that and it certainly motivates me to write a check faster.

In the Jan. LTN, we offered some sage advice to our community -- some of which you mirror, especially renegotiating existing vendor contracts.

Yvonne Dornic suggests looking into:
* leasing rather than purchasing equipment to help cash flow
* Using competitive bidding to drive down prices
Ross Kodner suggests using Skype for long distance (we're doing that for our podcasts already)
* YouSendIt.com and SendThisFile.com can be used as a free way to securely send large documents that might otherwise be messengered
Ditto for internet faxing. (Culver just sent a memo yesterday to NY on how to do it)

The NYTimes had an article yesterday about alternatives to business lunches -- including "coffee" or "breakfast" appts rather than lunch or dinner when you do need to have a face-to-face meeting.

And of course, the more "green" we go the more we can save money and resources.

Finally, I think we should seriously investigate outsourcing our data backup operations to Thomson or LexisNexis, which have huge, cost-effective and secure sophisticated set ups that would probably save us money AND protect our "mission-critical" data (A buzzword that actually means something in this context).

How about a green initiative involving miniature hydroelectric generators powered by energy captured from every IM toilet flush? If these haven't been invented yet, let's invent them!

Seriously though, I agree with Monica Bay and Christian Georgeou about up front discounts from vendors for early payment. And since I was talking with my friend John Pescatore (Circ. & Audience Devlpmt.) this morning about rates for online subscribers...I was thinking: would it be possible to devise a tiered payment arrangement for our online publications, with an incentive for people to subscribe for 1.5 years or 2 years if they pay in full up front? If, for example, a 1 year subscription to an online publication costs $200, we could boost our immediate cash flow by charging them $365, say, for 2 years if they pay within 45 days.....something like that.

Bill,

Thank you for looking into alternative ways to save money (and therefore our most valuable asset - our people). I've seen a lot of people blogging about this trend lately and many of the readers have had sarcastic comments about what they deem stingy new cost-saving policies at their various companies. My reaction to those people who have linked me to such blogs was that if it's going to save more people from losing their jobs, I'm all for the grass-roots approach to cutting costs.

There are hundreds of things each of us can do throughout our day that makes only a tiny difference - but adds up!! I cringe when I receive an overnight package that could have been shipped ground and saved $50. When companies continue in that flashy spending mentality and then lay off employees, it's easy to feel frustrated with your job. However, by including all of us in your review and letting us know what dire consequences not cutting back may have, we can all feel involved and valued. With any luck we'll all think twice about printing out a large document or sending something overnight.

Thank you for continuing to do business with transparency in mind. I think I speak for most of us when I say it's much appreciated.

Working from home can not only save the company money, but also save us commuters tons of money as well! Especially the ones coming from eastern Long Island like myself.

Thanks for keeping us all updated! It takes a weight off our shoulders when we are in the loop.

Amen, Renee! In Dallas, some of us drive 30-50 miles EACH WAY in to the office! An 8-hour day (usual) is actually me spending 9.5-10 hours a day away from my family and a 10-14-hour day (our weekly to-press days) is more like 12-16. Multiply that into a 5-day work week and I'm not gone 40-45 hours a week; more like 55 hours as my family sees it. There's something to be said for quality of life. AND it would save the company THOUSANDS... AND be a BIG tax write-off for all of us to be able to work from home as well (DSL charges, the percent of your home's square footage your office takes up, etc.) It would make losing the tuition reimbursement, taking mandatory unpaid vacation and/or even no raises this year so much easier to stomach if our commuting costs/time away from our families was reduced. I can't speak for everyone, but most of us production/art/edit people already have the equipment, we'd just need a server connection set up by IS and we'd be good to go.

Obviously, #1 is my vote, too, like many others here, but as I said in the first comment, we'll do whatever we need to do and again, we really do appreciate the openness and transparency.

Bill,

If I worked from home I could afford to take 3 unpaid days off per month. That's how expensive my monthly commute and related expenses are. Add that against what the company would save on office space, and you're looking at real savings.

As someone whose ideas are included in the above list, I can't tell you enough how much I'd appreciate working from home.
Having done it quite a bit off and on over the years, it saves time, commuter expenses, parking costs, etc., etc.
It's less distracting and I happen to believe -- should I say this? -- that I do my best work from home.
When you can get up and literally walk into the "office" next door, and I do have one room set up as an office, it's energizing and promotes MORE work, not less.
The naysayers in my office will be quick to think this can't work with the new InCopy system, but I say it can -- with a little out-of-the-box thinking and a view to the greater benefit.
Those with control issues will raise that old saw, which I've heard before, but I would argue that empowering people and treating them with trust and confidence will produce more work, not less.
As for required unpaid leaves, well, I just flat-out couldn't afford it.
And thanks again for the collegial approach to this.

There are many people that come to work on the weekends, now I understand the need to try to save money but are we to work in the dark?

I am really glad you are including us in the process. And I am sure that you ultimately will take whatever steps are best for the company. However, while some might not understand why the company spends money on "general interest publications," as a reporter for the NYLJ, I think that it's very important to be able to read such publications (to see what other news organizations are up to). Right now, we (the NYLJ) only has one copy of the WSJ and other papers. I would hate to see these papers eliminated.
Also, printing often and quickly is very important for reporters on deadline. We frequently have to print opinions, court papers, and other documents that we receive via email for articles we are writing. While we all try very hard not to be wasteful and frequently scan items, it's difficult (if not impossible) to write a story without being able to look at hard copies of these documents. Having access to fast printers (and not having to cut corners when it comes to printing) is critical to getting a good product out the door every day. I would hate to see the company cut costs with respect to our ability to print.

Thanks again for including us in this very important process!

At the risk of being tarred and feathered, can we suspend cable TV service in the office?

I love 14 because that is the way the world is going. Print newspapers, and likely print magazines, are going the way of VHS and vinyl records. Switching to electronic delivery saves money now, and positions us for the future. Daily newspapers are, by definition, yesterday's news. They can't survive in an age of instant information. Actually, the top 15 make a lot of sense to me.

Monica is right about Skype. Good service at a low price. It's also good for conference calls. If you're pushing out podcasts, consider libsyn.com as a cheap, quality source for unlimited bandwidth. Also GoDaddy.com for cheap domain registrations.

Items 2, 3, and 6 of the bottom list would be easiest to deal with, imho.

I'm afraid option 5,6 11 & 13 are all going to have a negative impact on sales, which is probably the last thing we want. It's ironic that #11 is even an option since our business depends on people not canceling their print subscription.

The pay freeze and no 401-K matching is the most reasonable place to start. In fact, I was expecting that from the beginning and have been surprised that it hasn't been done yet. I'm sure that there are many of us who would be more than happy to sacrifice that if that saves us enough money to not lay off one more of our colleagues and friends.

How about e-billing? A number of my clients end up requesting electronic invoices already-payments get made just as quickly, perhaps more efficiently. Tear-sheets could be sent out separately as they often are anyhow.

I'm a big fan of open source software. And we could use it to save a lot of money.

For example, as a web editor, I crop and resize images every day. But I don't need expensive software like Photoshop to do those tasks -- I use a free app called GIMP (Gnu Image Manipulation Program). http://gimp.org/

We could save a bundle if we replaced Microsoft Office with the open-source (and free) OpenOffice suite on all our company computers. ($300 per MS license x 880 employees = ~ $250K?). http://why.openoffice.org/

Or how about we ditch our Microsoft Exchange servers (with its tiny user storage allocations and high maintenance requirements) for a corporate email solution like Google Apps which would offer all the ease of Gmail (with 250! times the per user storage capacity) while maintaining our corporate branding. http://www.google.com/apps/business/index.html