Newspaper Audience - 2006 Annual Report

Industry associations and newspaper company executives in 2005 offered a host of rejoinders. A main strategy was to shift the discussion to newspaper readership and total audience reach.

Readership (which takes into account the pass-along effect of newspapers and is discussed at length below) is of course a much bigger number than circulation, roughly 126 million on the average weekday, according to the Newspaper Association of America, compared with 51 million daily circulation. Readership is declining, too, but more slowly than paid circulation.9

Another response among some executives is that the situation is not as bad as it looks. Some of the biggest losers in the September 2005 reporting period, like the San Francisco Chronicle (17%) and Orlando Sentinel (11%) said they had deliberately made big cuts in lower-quality promotional circulation sponsored by hotels and other businesses.10

Executives also argue that even after the losses of the last two years, newspapers remain the most effective way to reach a broad audience and deliver results for advertisers. That will be put to the test as newspapers try to raise advertising rates in 2006 even in the face of the negative circulation trends.

Are these industry responses just PR, or is there substance to the calmer response that the circulation losses do not, in the end, amount to the beginning of a rapid descent?

Most of those we have consulted who follow the situation closely believe that for now, the industry is not on the precipice of a sudden and dramatic loss of audience. Gary Meo, an executive at Scarborough Research, provided a candid summary for Editor & Publisher. “The perception that newspapers are losing readers in droves isn’t true,” he said. “They’re losing them in a trickle.”11

To assess whether “trickle” is too sanguine a word, after nearly two decades of circulation losses, a closer look at what is causing the losses would help.