Walter Erbe is the kind of local advertiser that daily newspapers need to survive. Now, he’s mad, and that spells trouble.

The general manager of Samy’s Camera, a Playa del Rey-based chain with six stores in Southern California, has long been buying full- and half-page ads in the Los Angeles Times, and some of those have brought as many as 1,000 customers per week to his stores in L.A.’s Fairfax district, Culver City, Pasadena and Santa Ana.

But now, alarmed over ever-deepening cuts at the Times – including the recent announcement that the paper would eliminate its local-news California section come March 1 – Erbe is considering pulling most or all of his remaining ads.

“It sucks. It will absolutely cause us to rethink our advertising strategy,” Erbe said. “With the California section closing, the paper is getting thinner and thinner, and the already dwindling number of people the Times reaches will dwindle even further. At some point, you have to wonder, are people still going to buy the paper? Will our ads reach anybody?”

Erbe is far from alone in re-evaluating his company’s advertising strategy. As the Times, the Los Angeles Daily News and other daily newspapers have undergone round after round of cuts over the last five years and circulation has continued to slide, advertisers all over the region are reconsidering their ad choices.

“If we haven’t already passed the tipping point where print media no longer makes sense for advertisers, then we’re very close to that point,” said Sanjay Sood, associate professor of marketing at the UCLA Anderson School of Management.

Sood said daily newspapers like the Los Angeles Times are in the midst of a vicious descending loop. As advertising revenues fall, newspapers must cut the size of their papers and staffs to bring costs into line. But that drives away readers, which in turn causes advertisers once again to pull back, perpetuating the cycle. The recession, he said, is accelerating the downward spiral.

Late last month, as he announced another in a series of layoffs, Los Angeles Times Publisher Eddy Hartenstein announced that the paper was eliminating its California section to cut printing costs. Local news stories will be folded into its front section.

Keeping advertisers

Scott McKibben, Times chief revenue officer, defended the cuts in a statement to the Business Journal and said the publication will work to keep advertisers on board.

“The same challenges that face the companies the Times reports about are also affecting us and we need to implement changes to both our flagship print edition, and throughout our organization, that will ensure our future,” McKibben said in the statement. “We’re working closely with all our advertisers and have heard from many who understand and support the changes we’re undertaking.”

Amid continuing and greater than expected revenue shortfalls, as well as staggering debt, the Times’ corporate parent, Tribune Co., filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in December.