I’ve been particularly remiss in updating information about the newspapers in Northern Ireland. I keep a track of the Google (and others) searches directing people to this poor blog. Of late, I noticed that a good few searches were coming in looking for information on Northern Ireland newspaper circulations. I’d hate to fell that you didn’t get what you were looking for: Title Jan – June 2008 Jul – Dec 2008 Jan – June 2009

The “Island Of Ireland” report was released today charting the path of Irish Newspapers since the beginning of the year and comparing them to the same period in 2008. No prizes for guessing the outcome. First off I will have a look at the market overall, which as you can see, has dropped nearly 100,000 copies in the year or 4.6%. The Sunday market contributed for almost half of the decline and only one paper

In the Sunday segment one of the only papers in the report to grow its circulation was the Sunday Business Post, so congratulations to them. The rise can be attributed to a very strong start to the year, so perhaps an ‘r’ is good for a business newspaper. The Sunday Times also managed the bestgrowth of all papers in the report gaining a very healthy 11%. But, and not to rain too much on the

Finally, the beleaguered evening market, down another 10,000 copies  or 9% year on year. How long these losses are sustainable is beyond me. The Herald is now under serious downward pressure and certainly not helped by the proposed merger of the Healed AM and Metro into the “Hetro”. It will be interesting as IN&M own all of the Herald and will own 1/3 of the new company/freesheet – decisions , decisions. 2008 2009 Diff Diff

The rise and rise of the slow decline of Morning Newspaper Circulations! Without the introduction of the Irish Daily Mail, the market would be down just over 68,000 (or 11%) in four years. Taking the Mail into account its down 10,000 copies in the same period reaching the heady heights of 713,000 in July – Dec ’07, the morning market is now back below early 2004 level

On the Sunday side the market is also showing a downward trend having lost 69,000 copies in the last four years and or 11% decline in total. January 2004 the market stood at 1.274m copies every Sunday, it’s now to just a shade above 1.20m copies every Sunday.  Over the four years some titles have bucked the overall newspaper tend completely – most notably the Sunday World where circulations have grown by nearly 17,000 copies.

On the Sunday side the market is also showing a downward trend having lost 69,000 copies in the last four years and or 11% decline in total. January 2004 the market stood at 1.274m copies every Sunday, it’s now to just a shade above 1.20m copies every Sunday.  Over the four years some titles have bucked the overall newspaper tend completely – most notably the Sunday World where circulations have grown by nearly 17,000 copies.

The picture for the newspaper circulations still looks bleak. Some papers really struggled in the past twelve months and some managed to completely buck the trend, with very few titles staying in positive territory. In volume terms the most notable loss comes from the News of the World dropping 17,345 copies every Sunday. This is followed by the Sunday Independent shaving 12,000 off its sale. Bucking the trend was The Sunday World adding 1,400 copies.