Day: 14 January 2011

December never brings any real cheer to the Newspaper Business – its a month where minds are on festivities and certainly not on print. This December will also be fondly remembered for the blanket of snow, which probably didn’t help figures in some quarters. The Mail on Sunday is the only paper here to be up on the year and, bar the Independent on Sunday, no paper is up month on month.     

The tabloids seem to suffer the most, both on a month on month basis down nearly 17,000 and year on year down close to 19,000. The Sun took the biggest blow down nearly 7,000 on month on month followed by the Daily Star back over 4,000.

This was also reflected in the Sundays where the red-tops accounted for almost all of the fall of 23,000 in the Sunday market. Ironically the Sunday Star took the biggest fall year on year. One can only speculate if those numbers were the catalyst for the closure announcement earlier this month. The News of the World had a bad month at the office falling 10,000 copies – their biggest month on month fall over the past two years. That’s not any cause for concern yet, but come Feb/March it would be.

Stable mate, The Sunday Times, also was a faller by over 5,000 copies. Add these to falls of The Sun in the morning and the circulation department in News international are shy 267,000 copies across the three titles for December or a hefty €325,000 at the till.

Throw enough promotions/money at the market and some of it will stick – and that’s borne out with the November December figures in the Mail on Sunday.  

The total market is down 41k year on year, not the ideal way to finish the year.