Entire Mel Magazine Staff Laid Off – Again – as New Owner Pulls the Plug

thewrap.com:

Mel Magazine, which ceased publication in March 2021 before being bailed out by Recurrent Ventures, has been shut down once again as all 15 staffers were let go on Friday.

According to AdWeek, the layoffs at the men’s lifestyle site happened during the daily editorial staff meeting via Google Hangout as staffers were informed of the decision and then kicked out of the meeting as their access to Slack and company emails were cut off.

AdWeek reports that staff were not told why they had been laid off. Recurrent Ventures acquired Mel magazine in July 2021, but was unable to monetize the site, spokeswoman Karen Hebert told TheWrap via email about the company’s reorganization. “We have also made the difficult decision to pivot our editorial and acquisition focuses away from the Lifestyle vertical which includes our key Lifestyle brand, MEL,” Hebert wrote.

She credited the “tremendous job,” done by co-founder and editor-in-chief Josh Schollmeyer and executive editor Lindsay Schrupp, as well as “the incredibly talented writers,” saying, “We love MEL and are very aware that the team has been through a lot over the last few year.”Her email also stated, “However, we’ve spent more than a year implementing and strategizing a variety of different monetization channels that haven’t gained traction.