What else is there to say about the latest newspaper sales – half a million gone in a year on the ABC audit? It’s the digital revolution, isn’t it? It’s the march of the smartphone commuter. It’s the American way becoming our way too. Just look at the slide in single-copy (ie, non-subscription) sales across the US, as analysed by the great guru Ken Doctor for the Nieman Lab at Harvard. But wait a moment, because Doctor has a more mundane thesis to add.
“Think back to the days when a cup of coffee cost 50 cents and the morning paper half as much. For less than a buck total, you could browse through the day’s news at your leisure at the corner coffee shop… But today, stop by Starbucks on a Sunday morning, and a cup of artisanal joe and a New York Times may set you back more than ten bucks.” In short, it’s also the economy, stupid!
Over recent years, US publishers have piled on cover price rises – Doctor calls it “quarteritus” – in order to make good advertising drops and investment in web technology, and that, up to a point, has worked. More cash has been squeezed from a smaller core of readers. But stopping at a newsagent to pick up a single copy? That’s becoming obsolete. The New York Daily News has lost 43% of its single-copy circulation over the last three years and is now up for sale.
And there seems to be a direct correlation between US sales loss and higher cover pricing. The greater the percentage price rise the greater the loss, according to the Newspaper Association of America’s top audience expert. “If you don’t price up, it’s at most a 5% erosion.” Something else to ponder over a second espresso at Starbucks.
