Administrators running long-established Shipley printing firm WE Berry Ltd have laid-off more than half of its workforce.

The 83 redundancies are the first cuts made since the 120-year-old family-run business was placed into administration nearly three weeks ago at the request of its directors.

It leaves 59 staff at the company in Otley Road.

Administrators Paul Flint and Richard Fleming of KPMG Corporate Recovery, said they were still hopeful of securing a future for the business as there had been a "reasonable" level of interest in it.

The company, which turned over £16 million in the last financial year, has blamed its problems on over-capacity in the printing industry and shortage of work.

Mr Flint said he regretted having to make the cuts shortly before Christmas which has come as another blow to the district's manufacturing industry.

"It is unfortunate that we have had to make redundancies at this stage," he said.

"However, after trading the business for the past three weeks, it has become clear that the orders in the pipeline for January, coupled with the relatively low levels of activity experienced by the print sector at the start of the year, means that it is not viable for us to continue to trade the business at full capacity."

Mr Flint added: "We are still hopeful, however, of finding a buyer in the New Year.

"While we have received a reasonable level of interest so far, we now need to look carefully at all of the options and continue our discussions with the various parties to identify a solution."