Two office staff will lose their jobs, as will two staff in the wholesale division at the Oasthouse, which will still continue as an off-licence liquor outlet.
The trust has had its head office in Oamaru since it was first elected in 1961, but over the past 12 months has undertaken restructuring after substantial losses.
Trust chairman Ali Brosnan said yesterday a lot of work had been done to streamline the trust's business.
Since 2008, that had included sharing an Ashburton-based chief executive, Fraser Leddie, and financial administration with the Ashburton, Cheviot and Geraldine trusts.
Mr Brosnan said the trust had "very capable managers" at North Star, Oasthouse, Kingsgate Brydone Hotel and its new Waitaki Wine and Spirits outlet to manage the businesses.
"We have done a lot of work to streamline the trust to maximise the return to the community.
"We have just completed our budgets for the coming [financial] year and are very confident of a reasonable year, subject to wider economic conditions," he said.
Work at the office had reduced substantially in recent years and the trust had to adapt to changing market conditions.
It had also decided to reduce wholesaling throughout Otago because of the costs in comparison to the returns.
He wanted to stress the decisions were not through the fault of employees, but were part of restructuring that started about six months ago.
After North Otago voted in 1960 to end prohibition, it also decided to have a community-owned trust handle liquor sales.
The first trust was elected in 1961.
At its peak, the trust owned liquor outlets, accommodation and hotels from Evansdale to north Oamaru and inland to Enfield and was also involved in the Dunedin market, through the Shoreline.
