By the Project for Excellence in Journalism and Rick Edmonds of The Poynter Institute
In 2004, the newspaper circulation losses that had been building slowly over 15 years began to accelerate.
In 2005 things got roughly three times worse.
And in 2006, newspaper executives at best hoped only to slow the bleeding. Few were arguing that the numbers would head back up or even stabilize.
Those results for the six months ending September 2005 — industry circulation down 2.6% daily and 3.1% Sunday from the same period in 2004 — were ugly. During that earlier period, in turn, the industry had recorded losses of 0.9% daily and 1.5% Sunday.1 [1]
Thus in just two years, daily circulation fell about 3.5%, Sunday 4.6%.
U.S. DAILY NEWSPAPER CIRCULATION |
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Circulation in millions, weekday and Sunday editions, 1990-2004
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Source: Editor and Publisher Yearbook data
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Average Circulation of U.S. Daily Newspapers |
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Weekday and Sunday editions, 1990-2004
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Source: Editor and Publisher Yearbook data
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While daily circulation had been on the decline since 1988, and Sunday’s since 1993, we’ve now seen a fairly significant change. Until 2004, daily losses were less than 1% a year, and those were driven in significant measure by the closing of evening newspapers, a problem that seemed to be reaching its limit. Sunday circulation was shrinking by less than 0.5% a year.
Between 2001 and 2003, moreover, the losses in daily circulation slowed, and it looked as if circulation could be stabilizing.2 [4]
But in 2004 the declines resumed, and in 2005 they gained a new momentum. Perhaps even more worrisome, the key factor driving the circulation losses now was the movement of readers, especially young ones, to online alternatives — a pressure that is likely only to increase (see Online Audience [5]).