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To: abb

http://www.boston.com/business/globe/articles/2006/10/31/state_newspaper_sales_fall_faster_than_the_us_average?mode=PF
State newspaper sales fall faster than the US average

By Robert Gavin, Globe Staff | October 31, 2006

Circulation at Massachusetts daily newspapers fell faster than the national average over the past year, according to newspaper industry groups.

The Boston Globe's average daily circulation declined 7 percent to about 386,000 in the six months ended Sept. 30, from 414,000 a year earlier.

Daily circulation of the Boston Herald fell 12 percent, to 203,000 from 230,000, according to the Audit Bureau of Circulations, an independent group that monitors newspaper circulation and readership.

The Globe's Sunday circulation fell 10 percent to 587,000 from 652,000. The Herald's Sunday sales fell 13 percent, to 115,000 from 132,000.

Nationally, daily newspaper circulation fell 2.8 percent, according to an analysis of the audit bureau's data by the Newspaper Association of America. Sunday circulation fell 3.4 percent nationally.

With a technically sophisticated population, Massachusetts is probably seeing readers migrate to Internet news sources faster than the national average, said Lou Ureneck, chairman of Boston University's journalism department.

"It seems ironic that a state with a well-educated, news-hungry population would show reductions in newspaper circulation," Ureneck said. "But this state is an early adopter of technology and highly wired."

Indeed, newspapers across the country are struggling with the transition from print to online media. While online editions are attracting record numbers of readers, they aren't making enough money to offset shrinking circulation and advertising revenues from print.

As a result, some big media companies, such as Tribune Co. of Chicago, are putting papers up for sale to satisfy Wall Street's hunger for bigger profits. In Boston, a local group led by former General Electric Co. chairman Jack Welch and Jack Connors, cofounder of the Boston advertising firm Hill Holliday, is considering a bid to buy the Globe from The New York Times Co.

Average daily newspaper circulation in Massachusetts fell 6 percent overall, as many other Massachusetts dailies reported circulation declines that were steeper than the national average.

Among the largest papers outside of Boston, the Telegram & Gazette of Worcester reported an 11 percent decline in average daily circulation. The T&G, like the Globe, is owned by The New York Times Co. Among other big papers in the state, circulation at The Patriot Ledger of Quincy fell 4 percent and was down 3.5 percent at the Republican of Springfield.

At the Globe, spokesman Alfred S. Larkin Jr. attributed some of the paper's circulation loss to the migration to the Internet. In the same six-month period the Globe's circulation was falling, unique visits to the Globe's online affiliate, Boston.com, averaged 3.9 million a month, up from 3.6 million a year earlier.

"The Globe continues to develop a strategy across print and digital media," Larkin said. "We are continuing to try and build our print readership, while building our online viewership."

Other factors contributing to the decline included cancellations following the accidental release early this year of subscribers' credit card information, Larkin said. In addition, the Globe continues to purposely cut its bulk sales, in which single parties, such as a hotels, schools or airlines, buy many papers, typically at a discount, and distribute them, often for free.

Advertisers look less favorably on bulk circulation because it's difficult to track how many papers actually end up in readers' hands and who those readers are.

Larkin said bulk sales reductions accounted for about one-seventh of daily circulation loss and about half of Sunday's decline

Gwen Gage, spokeswoman for the Herald, said the tabloid cut its daily bulk sales by more than 20,000 papers, accounting for about 80 percent of its daily circulation loss. Bulk sales reductions accounted for about one-fourth of the Sunday losses. Still, Gage said, the paper's readership is growing through its website. The number of unique visitors to the site has increased to 2.1 million a month, an increase of about 500,000 from a year earlier.

Robert Gavin can be reached at rgavin@globe.com.


29 posted on 10/31/2006 5:47:24 AM PST by abb (The Dinosaur Media: A One-Way Medium in a Two-Way World)
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To: abb

http://www.newsday.com/business/ny-bznews4954463oct31,0,4671585,print.story?coll=ny-business-print
Newspaper readership still slipping
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BY TOM INCANTALUPO
Newsday Staff Writer

October 31, 2006

Most of the nation's largest newspapers, including Newsday, lost still more readers in the six months ending Sept. 30, an industry group said yesterday. Analysts said some of it was voluntary as papers trimmed unprofitable circulation, but that the industry continued to lose ground to electronic and Internet news outlets.

In New York, The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal also slipped while the New York Daily News and New York Post countered the trend with increases in daily circulation of 1 percent and 5.1 percent, respectively, that put the Post ahead of the News for the first time.

Average paid weekday circulation at 770 U.S. newspapers reporting fell by 2.8 percent in the six-month period from a year earlier, according to the Audit Bureau of Circulations, to 43.7 million. Sunday circulation fell by 3.4 percent, to 47.6 million.

The nation's largest paper, USA Today, reported a 1.3 percent drop, to 2.3 million, while No.2 Wall Street Journal fell 1.9 percent to 2,043,235 copies. The New York Times, the third largest, reported daily circulation fell by 3.5 percent from a year earlier, to 1,086,798. Circulation at Newsday, the 10th largest paper, fell by 5 percent, to 410,579 copies.

Media analyst Edward Atorino for the Manhattan brokerage The Benchmark Co. said the average decline was no surprise but that some individual ones stood out, including an 8 percent drop, to 775,766 copies, in daily circulation at the Los Angeles Times, a property of Newsday's owner, Tribune Co. of Chicago. "That's a shocker," he said.

He said papers, including the Los Angeles Times, were cutting back on bulk sales to schools, hotels and the like, which are considered less valuable by advertisers, and also on sales in geographical fringe areas. Other factors in the declines, aside from TV and the Internet, he said, are "do not call" laws that inhibit marketing, and the tendencies of young people to begin reading newspapers later in life than their predecessors, and of older people to stop earlier.

Los Angeles Times publisher David D. Hiller said, "The September statement reflects our ongoing focus on individually paid circulation - the audience advertisers value most."

Atorino attributed the Post's gain to its gossipy Page Six and to contests and other marketing tactics. "They give away a lot of stuff and have all kinds of games," he said. "They promote the hell out of the paper."

Post editor-in-chief Col Allan contended that the Daily News runs just as many contests, though he conceded that Page Six is a major draw. "I just think we have more fun producing the paper," he said. "It has more energy and it's more readable."

But the accuracy of the Post's figures has been the subject of debate between the two papers; an article last week in the News quoted the Audit Bureau saying the Post last year overstated about 6,000 daily sales a day and the number of papers sold in the metropolitan area by more than 10,000 a day.

Newsday publisher Timothy Knight said in a statement to employees that the Long Island paper's figures reflected a focus on full-price home delivery circulation and single copy sales at retail outlets. "We will continue to focus on circulation and readership initiatives that attract and retain readers that are of the highest value to our advertisers," Knight said.

Tribune Co.'s Chicago Tribune newspaper reported a 1.7 percent drop in circulation, to 576,132 copies, in the half year ended Sept. 30.

Under pressure from investors, Tribune management is looking into a possible sale or breakup of the company.

The Newspaper Association of America, a trade group based in Vienna, Va., said the circulation figures fail to reflect significant gains in readers of news-paper Web sites, to a record 58 million during September.

Association president John F. Sturm said in a statement, "The circulation figures are in range with what we expected as publishers are refocusing their marketing efforts on adding and retaining the readers that deliver most value to advertisers and make economic sense."


30 posted on 10/31/2006 5:48:18 AM PST by abb (The Dinosaur Media: A One-Way Medium in a Two-Way World)
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