Employees at outdoor advertising heavyweight oOh!media say the company’s increasingly forceful efforts to court private equity interest are weighing heavily on staff, with some describing the mood inside the business as “depressed.”
oOh!media — Australia’s biggest owner of street furniture, billboard and bus shelter advertising assets, and a familiar presence on commuter routes nationwide — has been entertaining takeover approaches for about three months.
The Australian Financial Review has reported that Pacific Equity Partners, Oaktree Capital and Bain Capital are among the potential buyers circling the company.
But while the prospect of a deal has generated plenty of market chatter, many of the workers who could soon find themselves under new ownership appear far less excited about what may come next.
According to the Daily Mail, uncertainty around the sale process, combined with repeated restructures and a recent wave of redundancies, has sharply damaged morale across parts of the business.
One industry source said the constant shifts in direction and “changing goalposts” had left behind a “depressed culture” that any eventual buyer would have to manage from day one.
“They’re all miserable. We’re private, we’re public. It’s that sort of thing that creates uncertainty,” the insider said, referring to the instability staff feel around the company’s future.
The source added that the reputation of private equity ownership has only intensified anxiety among employees. “The thing with private equity is they come in and slash and burn, so people are very much worried about the future. That sort of fear spreads like wildfire.”
Australia’s largest holder of street furniture, billboards and bus shelter assets, oOh!media has been fielding private equity offers for the last three months
Last month, oOh!media slashed nine per cent of its workforce as part of its ongoing restructure, euphemistically titled ‘Operational Excellence Program’
The source further said there had been a recent influx of oOh!media staffers looking to jump ship to competing agencies.
‘There’s a lot of concern about job security – that’s a given, especially when it’s paired with the stress of a mortgage.’
Recent reviews on workplace forum Glassdoor suggest it’s not all beer and skittles in oOh!media, which has traditionally been a coveted workplace within the industry.
‘Aggressive positioning of the company for sale to PE [private equity] is obvious,’ said one review dated earlier this month, corroborating what sources have told the Mail.
Another review posted a week earlier also stated that ‘constant talks about potential PE buyout not very good for morale.’
‘Frequent redundancies and ongoing organisational changes, often with limited communication and transparency. This creates uncertainty and impacts employee morale,’ said one review in June.
‘If the board wants to sell to PE and the bottom line needs to look good, I understand the decisions made so far. Just don’t expect anyone to enjoy it,’ another employee wrote.
Last month, oOh!media slashed nine per cent of its workforce as part of its ongoing restructure, euphemistically titled ‘Operational Excellence Program’.
CEO James Taylor told shareholders in May he was confident that ‘further efficiencies’ would be identified
Mr Fairhurst also said that introducing ‘agentic AI’ into the brief-to-booking process would ‘improve efficiency, consistency and effectiveness’
Out of the 82 affected roles, 20 came from the shuttering of Reo, the company’s retail advertising branch, while 24 were vacant positions that oOh!media chose to not backfill.
Anonymous reviews also indicate that, following the ‘expensive’ redundancies, remaining employees were being asked to carry the load and do more with less.
‘Very unstable place – redundancies since Covid and people left behind have to work more,’ said a review from May.
‘What’s left is a hollowed workforce expected to carry the load: more work, broader roles, constant pressure,’ somebody wrote last week.
The concerns raised by staff follow comments Mr Taylor made during a shareholder meeting in May.
‘I am confident further efficiencies will be identified,’ he said.
At the same meeting, a presentation slide referred to the company’s aim of achieving a ’40 per cent faster time to revenue’ in the second half of 2026.
The Daily Mail understands this deliverable refers to the time it takes to get a physical asset, such as a billboard or bus shelter screen, into the ground.
In 2025, the sales team was also given a target of reducing the ‘brief-to-booking’ time by 30 per cent, under a ‘significant transformation program’ titled ‘Simpler, Faster, Smarter’.
At the annual general meeting in May, Chief Revenue Officer Mark Fairhurst said the restructure was for ‘greater alignment, coherence, and speed to market’.
Mr Fairhurst further said that introducing ‘agentic AI’ into the brief-to-booking process would ‘improve efficiency, consistency and effectiveness’.
oOh!media did not comment on whether the introduction of AI would see a headcount reduction in the sales team.
However, a spokesperson said structural changes had been underway ‘well before’ private equity suitors started knocking on the door, ‘as part of a longer-term effort to simplify how our teams operate’.
‘For too long, we’ve asked our teams to work with overly manual and outdated legacy systems. Over the past six months, we have been accelerating our efforts to significantly modernise our systems and the ways we work,’ the spokesperson said.
They would not comment specifically on whether the reduced headcount was motivated by presenting an attractive bottom line to private equity bidders, but acknowledged the ‘significant changes’ of 2026.
‘We acknowledge there has been significant change at oOh! over the past six months as we respond to the evolving media landscape and modernise the way we work.
‘Our people are fundamental to the ongoing success of our business, and we recognise that change can create uncertainty.
‘That’s why we’re committed to being transparent about our strategic priorities, the decisions we’re making and why, so our people have the clarity, context and confidence to do their best work.’
