More Layoffs at Ad Age; D.C. Bureau Chief Axed

(MoneyWatch)  Advertising Age has laid off five more editorial staffers, according to the New York Observer:

Since December, the magazine has let go a photo editor (Susan McCoy), editors of Special Reports (editors Dan Lippe and Mike Ryan Ad Age's special sections, which are not advertorial), and a copy editor whose name we have yet to learn. Further, we heard that Ira Teinowitz, the DC bureau chief, was let go yesterday.

Age had laid off at least three staffers prior to Xmas. The most surprising name in the new list is Teinowitz (pictured), who was one of Ad Age's better reporters. Food advertisers will be cheering the decision to ax Teinowitz. They blame him for coining the term "Big Food" to describe major food marketers like Kellogg, General Mills and McDonald's, at a time when they were being linked to the childhood obesity issue. Here is one of his recent scoops.

Teinowitz was a rare advertising reporter who felt comfortable reporting bad news about the industry. (Typically, ad reporters treat their sources with kid gloves, such as in this interview with Leo Burnett CEO Tom Bernardin in which an Age reporter neglects to ask him how his agency managed to defraud the U.S. Army of $15.5 million.)

UPDATE: Age's Jeremy Mullman points out to BNET in an email that Bernardin was asked about the fraud in its original coverage, which you can see here.

We interviewed Bernardin on the Army fraud and asked him those exact questions at the time that news broke.

Mullman adds:

Now perhaps we should have rehashed that stuff in the piece that followed. (My thinking was (1) it was settled, (2) it involved conduct that predated Bernardin's arrival at Leo, and (3) that we had a limited amount of time and space and already had his answer on the record.) But any assertion that we didn't ask those questions to him is inaccurate. Anyhow, that's my two cents. I do enjoy your blog but felt we weren't treated fairly on that one.

The layoffs bring the BNET Ad Agency Layoff Counter to 25,499.