There's no telling when the “revenue destruction” at U.S. newspaper publisher Tribune Co. will end, but the most difficult hardships may soon be over, the company's Chairman Sam Zell told employees Tuesday over the company's intranet, the Chicago Tribune reported Wednesday.

“We're not interested in dying by 1,000 cuts,” Zell told employees. “We're doing everything we can to make this downsizing happen as quickly and as painlessly as possible.”

Employee numbers at newspapers across the company have shrunk in recent months due to rounds of layoffs, and the size of its newspapers has also slimmed down. The next round of cutbacks should be the last, he said, according to the Chicago Tribune.

Zell took the Chicago-based media company private at the end of 2007 in a US$8.2 billion buyout.

“Zell said repeatedly that he had no intention of cutting his way to profitability, something several Tribune reporters reminded him of Tuesday,” the Chicago Tribune article stated. Zell, however, said that due to the newspaper industry's massive revenue fall throughout 2008, it was “unfair to hold him to previous forecasts.”

Reducing staff levels by as much as 25 percent, as well as redesigning newspapers and making them smaller are the only options the company has to survive in the short-term, Zell said, according to the Baltimore Sun.

“We're looking at some of the worst advertising numbers in the history of the world,” he said, according to the Sun. “I have a responsibility ... to keep this business alive when cash flow has eroded at a prodigious level.”

To offset revenue declines, Chief Operating Officer Randy Michaels told employees the company is developing several initiatives. In cities where the company owns several media outlets, the company will create “breaking news centres,” while at the Los Angeles Times, for example, a team of sales people has formed to seek out promotions budgets from advertisers, not just traditional display advertising, the Chicago Tribune reported.