Remarkably, there’s now no ‘solid’ (in my eyes) metric for the best selling Irish Morning Newspaper. Having suddenly jettisoned their ABC certification, we can now only rely on the JNRS and perhaps some web metrics, when and if they appear, for some solid ‘market’ data on the Irish Independent. My views on the JNRS are easy to find here and my apathy towards them is not veiled. I’m sure that across Europe most of the
At the outset I’d apologise on behalf of the Newspaper industry: the table below is a numerical assault on the eye – but we now have three metrics for each year: Print & Display, Print Only and Display only. I’d forward a second apology (not on behalf of the industry) directed at the readers of this analysis and it would be on the back of the lack of meaningful data. Personally, I find some of
Just a brief one today! The mornings show a ‘blue moon’ event with The Sun adding 2,500 in the month to get it close to last year’s figure, over the sixty and way ahead of The Star. The Mail see-sawed again and drops 15,000 on the month. The Sun on Sunday also made progress adding 1,700 and the Sunday Times managed a marginal increase.
There’s very little in terms of reporting this month. It marks the half way point and these will be the last figures to go towards the Jan-June 2015 ABC . Nothing would make me happier than to be reporting the six month figures, but we have to wait another forty one days until the Old guard deem it fitting that they allow us an insight into some metrics of their business. We have no analytics
The May figures are out and show the same pattern as has been apparent for the last few years at this point. The Mirror is sitting on the edge of the 30’s and the other two tabloids are heading (albeit slowly) to the 40’s. The Daily Star lost 2,200 in the month, something it can’t afford to do on a monthly basis. Promotions and a few extra multiple copy sales added close to 4,000 to
Another month and more figures. April had Easter, so there were the normal exclusions for Good Friday and Easter Monday in the daily market. Still the picture was the same downward trajectory. The Daily Mirror dropped 1,200 on the month or 3% while the other Tabloids had mixed fortunes both up and down. Collectively down 1,500 on the month, but the 2,400 increase on the month for the Daily Mail resulted on morning papers up
Cheltenham was the only event to bring a smile to tabloid newspaper executives with the Star and Sun adding a few copies this month on the back of the festival. Surprisingly The Mirror didn’t see any payout from the horses and they actually lost 300 odd copies month on month. The Daily star did exceptionally well adding 2,300 to its figure and the Sun added 1,400. But the uplift will be fleeting and April will
My elation from yesterday, at what could have been perceived as a softening of the falls, was short lived when it was pointed out that the February ABC figures I had used were in fact the six month average to February and not the February only ABC. As you will see below the picture is indeed bleak (I should have known: it was “good news” in the same sentence as “Newspapers” – seriously). In fact
The bi-annual speculation begins in earnest today about the ‘future of print’ with the eventual release of the last of the six-month figures for the Irish Newspapers, today covering July to December 2014. Taking and over view first: over the twelve months the overall market has declined by a further 7%. And both the Sunday and morning market have also fallen by 7%. There’s nothing at all positive in the overall figures with the rate of
The Sunday market fell 7% between July December 2013 and July December 2013. The market now stands at 756,118 copies every Sunday down 54,778 on the same period last year. The biggest selling paper on Sunday is still the Sunday Independent selling 219,007 copies every week. This is down 4.5% on the previous year or 10,375 copies and their actively purchased figure at 96% remains in line with last year. It’s followed by the Sunday
Morning newspapers saw a decline of 7.2% over the twelve months dropping to 450,956 for July December 2014. The three tabloids audited contributed close to half of that decline, dropping 16,371 collectively. The Irish Independent remains the largest selling paper in the morning moving 112,502 copies each day down 4% or 5,000 on July Dec 2014. It has to be noted that in this figure, 86.7% of that is actively purchased compared to 87.2% in
It was never going to be that difficult to increase sales on the back of a miserable December, which the morning market has done and it see a rise of over 13,000 on the month. However the year on year figure shows the morning market down over 19,000 on January 2014.These figures have to be a gift to some of the papers (notably the morning tabloids) who are struggling to maintain purchasers every morning. The
The final ABC of 2014 was released today. Both the December ABC and the July-Dec figure are available for the majority of papers in the Irish Market. Looking at the December ABC first: it’s a month that’s normally very quite in terms of newspaper sales and this is reflected in the morning figures here. The Daily Star had another torrid month dropping 2,200 in December alone. It’s not an isolated loss for the publication
One audit left for 2014 which will be issued early January. But it’s really all over bar the shouting at this stage. The tabloids took a beating again this month with only one notable good news story coming from New UK during the week regarding their digital offerings. The one number that caught my eye was the Daily Star (56,700)and its relentless race to the bottom (numerically). Now back into second place again behind The
The euphoria of the English premier league was short lived with the tabloids actually below where they were before the kick of a ball. Both The sun and The Star are at 58,000 and the Mirror at 46,000. In total the tabloids are down 6,600 month on month and nearly 17,000 on the year. The morning market now stands at 221,000 which is down 21,000 year on year. In the Sundays there were a few
As predicted, the tabloids slipped back after the euphoria of the start of the premiership abated in September. All the tabloids lost their August lustre and now it’s simply a slow decline to the “C” word on the 25th of December. The Star and Sun are now perilously close to the slipping into the 50’s. Both papers tested those waters briefly earlier in the year only to be saved by the kick of a ball
I had to double take on these sets of results – so used to the doom and gloom at follows the monthly figures like a bad smell that there was a modicum of disbelief and a measure of self-doubt about my ability to use a spreadsheet. But, no they are the real deal. In August, ever paper under scrutiny, made month on month gains bar the FT and the Mail on Sunday. I couldn’t recall
“Ta-da” – the cosmetic adverts catchphrase. I use it mockingly as it heralds the publication, finally, of the ABC’s of the reaming newspapers in the market. Plenty of cosmetics would be needed to make these figures even vaguely attractive. The total market contacted by 7% over a twelve month period. The market is still 204m newspapers a year, but falling at 7% per annum isn’t a sustainable business model. The morning market is falling faster
The morning market slipped back 6% to 463,000 since the audit of Jan-June 2013 and has now dropped 28% since 2000. The brunt of the fall was felt in the ‘red tops’ who collectively have fallen 35% since the millennium whereas the non red-tops have declined by 22%. The Irish Independent lost 8,700 copies or 7% of its circulation over the year and managed to kept the bulks at 13% the same as last
The market fell by -6% or 53,000 in twelve months. The Sunday Independent dropped 12,000 over the twelve months to 220,000. The Sunday world lost 13,000 which drops it back to below 200,000 to 198,000. The Sunday Business Post, despite a new look, lost 11% to rest at 34,000. The Daily Star on Sunday does nothing in the market here and is beginning to reap what is it has sown with an 11% decline
