A “For Sale” sign may be going up at Boston Globe headquarters.

The paper reported Wednesday that the Globe’s owner, the New York Times Company, has hired an investment bank to help unload the Globe in the wake of a contentious union vote that rejected contract concessions and a pay cut.

The paper is on track to lose $85 million this year and, according to potential buyers, the company has begun requesting bids for the paper.

The move comes just a day after the Globe’s largest union rejected $10 million in pay and benefit cuts offered by the paper’s owner that was designed to bring costs under control.

Now, talk of a sale is back in the air and workers are on edge.

The Globe reported that the paper’s owner, the New York Times, has hired investment bank Goldman Sachs to manage a possible sale. Two anonymous potential buyers said they were told bids would start being accepted on June 8, regardless of how the union voted.

With this news, and a 23 percent pay cut to take effect next week, Globe employees are understandably worried.

The Boston Newspaper Guild, the 700-member union that turned down the contract concessions, is fighting that pay cut.

A meeting with the National Labor Relations Board is set for next Tuesday.

Meantime, the New York Times Company reversed course Tuesday and said there were no plans to close the paper.

Of course, if there’s a new owner, all bets would be off.

The Times bought the Globe back in 1993 for $1.1 billion. In today’s money that is $1.6 billion, but the paper is now estimated to be worth far less.

(Source: WCVB)