The newspaper has also consolidated some print sections such as mashing its sports section into its business section, Forbes said.

Nevertheless, Sulzberger told employees that efforts were falling short. "We felt it was essential to take this step to further control our costs during these hard times."

Meanwhile, Detroit Media Partnership L P, which operates the Detroit Free Press and the Detroit News, is expected to announce next week that it will cease home delivery of the papers' print editions on most days of the week, the Wall Street Journal reported citing people familiar with the company's policy.

But actual scenario set to be unveiled Tuesday when the Free Press, the 20th largest US newspaper in terms of weekday circulation, and the News, are to end home delivery on all but the most lucrative days -- Thursday, Friday and Sunday.

On other days, the company would sell abbreviated print editions at newsstands and direct readers to the papers' expanded digital editions.

Both The Free Press, owned by Gannett Co and the News, owned by MediaNews Group, are operated by Detroit Media. The Free Press and the News would be the first dailies in a metropolitan market to curtail home delivery and scale down their print editions. But the Journal said other newspapers are contemplating similar moves.

In October, the Christian Science Monitor said it will stop printing a daily newspaper in April and move instead to an online version with a weekly print product.

The changes are likely to result in significant job cuts, the Journal said, adding that Gannett, which owns 85 daily newspapers, recently said it was eliminating 2,000 positions as part of a 10 per cent staff reduction. Two of its papers, USA Today and the Free Press, were not part of the layoff. "The Detroit Media Partnership is looking at everything right now just like everyone else in the country," its spokesman Leland K Bassett was quoted as saying. The cuts are expected to come mostly, if not entirely, from outside the newsroom, the report added.