By ANNE RILEY-KATZ
Graphic artists in India last week began designing classified ads for the Orange County editions of the Los Angeles Times and Recycler Classifieds, the start of a 13-week test of outsourcing graphic design for the papers.
The move comes as the Times, part of Chicago-based Tribune Co., is trying to cut costs and increase revenue.
Chicago-based Affinity Express Inc. submitted a bid for the work several months ago, said Kelly Glass, Affinity’s vice president of marketing. The work is being handled by the company’s subsidiary in Pune, India.
Times officials declined to comment on the number of bids received and the selection process.
Asked if the Times would consider expanding the program, spokesman David Garcia said the paper “will not discuss specific options that may or may not be under consideration.”
“I don’t know to what degree they’d want to expand (the program), but I know they are looking at cost savings and want to free up their artists for more time-sensitive work,” Glass said
Affinity already counts catalog-based clothing retailer Lands End Inc., Ikon Office Solutions Inc. and Xerox Corp. among the customers using its Indian operation.
The Times will have a dedicated team in India for its advertising work, Glass said, though she did not know the size of the group.
The Times released a statement on the pilot program that read in part:
“Ad production is a high-turnover operation and our intention is to implement this strategy over several months and without layoffs.”
Garcia was careful to point out that work,not jobs,are being sent to India in part to stem high turnover among ad production workers, which he estimated at about 20%.
“The pilot program vendor has the stable talent pool necessary to provide dependable creative production,” Garcia wrote.
If the test run is successful, about 40 to 50 Times ad production employees and another 10 to 20 Recycler workers could be replaced. Between 10 to 18 of the workers are expected to transfer to new positions at the Times or Recycler.
As part of the program, Affinity committed to on-time delivery and perfect layout proofs. Workers in India started by putting out parallel ads before transitioning to live ad production, Garcia said.
Riley-Katz is a staff writer with the Los Angeles Business Journal.
