ilevel Media, Marketing and Development

Day: 15 January 2010

  • Irish Newspaper Circulation revenues

    As it a calendar year it a good time to look at over numbers – but the ones that count – €’s. Looking at the circulation figures and the cover price of the respective papers – we can see the how the shift in numbers affects the top-line. There are a few caveats to this analysis. It’s the difference in average circulation between the first half and second half of the year, it’s the December cover price that’s used and a title with different cover price at the weekend – the week day cover price was used (normally the lesser). In the morning market the tabloids took the brunt of the blow accounting for about 70% of the decline. €6.5 was taken out of the market. That’s not €6.5m from the publishers – they would net about half of a titles revenue. There are plenty of mouths in that food chain – retailers, wholesalers, VAT etc. In the Sunday market – we’ll begin by ignoring the figures for the Sunday Mail. Again the tabloids are back a good bit and the market declined by nearly 18,000 copies. €8.2m was lost in this market on average throughout 2009.

    Title Total Ave Diff Cost
    Daily Mirror €19,647,940 -1551 -€483,964
    Daily Record €369,564 -1558 -€486,148
    Irish Daily Star €42,652,064 -5234 -€2,285,993
    The Sun €28,533,180 -5231 -€1,632,020
    Daily Express €788,736 112 €26,130
    Irish Daily Mail €15,304,328 -3175 -€990,444
    The Daily Telegraph €1,127,942 -175 -€65,645
    Financial Times €2,929,420 -396 -€308,750
    The Guardian €1,302,964 -348 -€108,472
    The Independent €399,152 -625 -€195,000
    The Times €818,558 -162 -€47,967
    Morning Market €113,873,848 -18342 -€6,578,273
    Daily Star – Sunday €6,298,510 -2012 -€219,692
    News of the World €9,640,528 -1752 -€127,533
    Sunday Mail €227,643 -4303 -€335,608
    Sunday Mirror €2,680,486 -567 -€38,318
    The People €1,485,792 -2614 -€176,695
    Sunday Express €334,880 -83 -€6,006
    Sunday Post €58,046 -19 -€1,273
    The Mail on Sunday €11,721,875 -1537 -€159,796
    Independent on Sunday €171,467 -231 -€22,806
    The Observer €1,117,084 -952 -€113,819
    The Sunday Telegraph €269,880 -176 -€18,269
    The Sunday Times €14,829,577 -2696 -€350,480
    Racing Post €954,612 -723 -€93,990
    Sunday Market €49,790,380 -17662 -€1,664,287
    Total Market €163,664,228 -36004 -€8,242,560

  • Irish Newspaper Circulation December 2009

    The last month of the year shows no improvements. The Redtops had a bit of a disaster – possibly down to poor distribution due to the adverse weather and also as a huge amount sporting events were cancelled – a big draw for their readers. The Daily Star was back over 5,000 month on month and The Sun back by 3,600. The latter is most likely still suffering from the vagaries of the Glass Palace in Stephens Street (AKA Dunnes Stores) where they stamped their feet and demanded their own T+C’s. When News International declined their offer, the Glass Palace and her cohorts locked all of their titles out of all their stores. They are suffering – more so in the Sunday market where they have two titles News Of the World (-5,938) and The Sunday Times (-7,044). Every Cloud….It seemingly saved the neck of The Sunday People who were making great strides to break through the 20’s mark and into their teens. But possible substitution at the newsstand in the aforementioned chain saw them actually gain 800 copies. The Morning Market dropped 12,000 copies, month on month. Bad Weather,  seasonal factors and general apathy were the factors there, the same ones that struck the Sunday Market which declined a massive 41,000 in the month – their single largest month on month decline . The Sunday Star accounted for nearly 22% of that decline knocking 9,078 off their numbers. The Mail on Sunday threw a few Euros in the promotions pot and still didn’t see the returns – they were down 9,480 – the biggest drop in the Sunday Market. The Sunday Mirror bagged 3,300 copies most likely from the Sunday Daily Star. Notably the Daily Record and the Sunday Mail still haven’t found the copies that went ‘missing’ mid year!

    Title Nov Dec
    Daily Mirror 60,381 59,857
    Daily Record 793 912
    Irish Daily Star 97,506 92,211
    The Sun 88,657 84,974
    Daily Express 3,116 3,090
    Irish Daily Mail 50,501 48,048
    The Daily Telegraph 2,782 2,827
    Financial Times 3,855 3,801
    The Guardian 4,050 3,962
    The Independent 1,192 1,200
    The Times 2,545 2,530
    Morning Market 315,378 303,412
    Daily Star – Sunday 61,379 52,301
    News of the World 126,497 120,559
    Sunday Mail 2,084 787
    Sunday Mirror 35,218 38,521
    The People 20,293 21,140
    Sunday Express 4,240 4,165
    Sunday Post 803 798
    The Mail on Sunday 122,701 113,221
    Independent on Sunday 1,624 1,598
    The Observer 9,405 8,749
    The Sunday Telegraph 2,414 2,467
    The Sunday Times 113,660 106,616
    Racing Post 7,065 7,065
    Sunday Market 507,383 477,987
    Total Market 822,761 781,399