Nobody was expecting a bright and shining set of circulation figures for August. But they are worse, surely, than anyone could have anticipated. I often talk in topographical terms about the rate of newspaper decline, noting that the gentle downward slope has been steepening in the past three years and that there are signs of an impending cliff-fall. Now, without any doubt, both the daily and Sunday red-tops - along with the middle-market Express titles - are toppling down that cliff face. Meanwhile, the Mail titles and the serious papers are still clinging on, having pioneered different ways of steering clear of the crevasse. For some, it maybe only a matter of time before they lose their footing, but they have shown resilience in the face of adversity.
As with the regional press, the nationals urgently need a better way of reporting their true "reach". The ABC print figures are no longer a good enough guide. It is obvious that The Guardian, the Daily Telegraph and The Times are being read online by increasing thousands of people and this needs to be reflected in monthly audience statistics if we're to have a genuine idea of the continuing power of those news "brands". Similarly, The Sun's ever-improving website is attracting a much wider audience despite the ongoing sales decline for its print editions. I know that the ABC council is giving this problem consideration, but time is running out. If advertisers are to have confidence in running ads in newspapers, in both print and online, they need to know the true audience and have confidence in the way that it's measured.
That said, let's look at the sad state of print sales. As Stephen Brook reports, despite the understandable interest provoked by the arrests of alleged plane bombers which helped to boost sales, most titles recorded significant declines this August compared to August 2005. This was, as I said, very noticeable among the daily "populars". The Sun fell by more than 4%; and that poor result was better than the Daily Express (-5.37%); Daily Mirror (-6.04%); the Daily Star (-7.26%); and the Daily Record (-8.65%). All their stablemate Sunday titles fell by roughly the same ratios too, with the Sunday Express performing worst of all in recording a 10.1% year-on-year loss. I checked back over the past 12 months and it's clear that the overall decline is speeding up.
The Daily Mail, shored up by 109,500 bulk sales, maintained its overall year-on-year figure while the serious press did rather well. The Guardian managed a 6.19% rise on a year ago; the Financial Times improved just a little; The Independent dropped by a mere 1,000 copies; and The Times and the Daily Telegraph recorded very minor losses. However, it's important to note that the Telegraph relied on 71,455 bulk sales - up by more than 20,000 than 12 months ago - to hold up its headline sale. Looking more closely at the figures, the Telegraph sold only 441,000 at its full cover price, fewer than The Times. Yet, as I discovered during my visit to its new headquarters this week (see Leaping into the future at the Telegraph's Camelot ), the online readership is growing all the time. It's another reason for papers to get together and solve the problem of providing multi-platform audience figures. (I'm going to report on Monday about an interesting initiative on this front by one of the biggest regional groups).
What is also noticeable is the sharp falling off buyers of the Scottish titles. The Scotsman was down year-on-year by 11.92% while its Glasgow-based rival, The Herald, fell by 6.09%. Their Sunday equivalents also fell by 8.99% and 6.76% respectively. This could be attributed to the general decline in the regions and to the especial level of newspaper competition in Scotland. But that's unconvincing. These are serious newspapers and they should be unaffected by the growth of the Metro title across their circulation area. So I'm uncertain exactly why they are falling so fast. All clues welcome.
