All UK regional dailies posted a decrease in sales for the first half of 2012 according to figures released today.
The best-performing daily titles were the two Channel Island papers, the Jersey Evening Post and Guernsey Evening Press, which each recorded a 1pc decrease.
On mainland Britain, the Western Morning News topped the league table with a 2.4pc year-on-year fall in circulation in the period January to June.
Here’s how each of the UK regional daily titles performed. The list includes several Johnston Press titles which have gone weekly since the period under review.
England
Western Morning News | 30,325 | -2.4pc | |
The Echo (Southend, Basildon, Castle Point) | 29,125 | -3.3pc | |
Yorkshire Post | 37,833 | -4.7pc | |
Burton Mail | 11,612 | -4.8pc | |
Hull Daily Mail | 41,222 | -5.3pc | |
Cambridge News | 19,860 | -5.4pc | |
Liverpool Echo | 80,762 | -5.5pc | |
Colchester Gazette | 15,259 | -5.6pc | |
Gloucestershire Echo | 14,999 | -5.6pc | |
Sheffield Star & Green ‘Un | 35,089 | -5.8pc | |
Southern Daily Echo | 29,973 | -6.2pc | |
Newcastle Evening Chronicle | 49,199 | -6.3pc | |
Dorset Echo | 16,313 | -6.4pc | |
The Press, York | 24,312 | -6.5pc | |
The Northern Echo | 38,479 | -6.6pc | |
Swindon Advertiser | 16,837 | -6.8pc | |
Derby Telegraph | 30,137 | -6.9pc | |
The Citizen, Gloucester | 18,501 | -7.1pc | |
Worcester News | 13,305 | -7.2pc | |
Bournemouth Daily Echo | 24,825 | -7.4pc | |
Northampton Chronicle & Echo | 15,197 | -7.4pc | |
Yorkshire Evening Post | 33,805 | -7.4pc | |
Huddersfield Daily Examiner | 18,971 | -7.6pc | |
Oxford Mail | 17,556 | -7.9pc | |
Western Daily Press | 26,053 | -8pc | |
Northamptonshire Evening Telegraph | 17,018 | -8.2pc | |
Carlisle News and Star (East) | 11,271 | -8.3pc | |
Grimsby Telegraph | 23,791 | -8.4pc | |
Liverpool Daily Post | 7,519 | -8.5pc | |
Teesside Evening Gazette | 36,986 | -8.8pc | |
North West Evening Mail | 12,884 | -8.8pc | |
Halifax Courier | 14,272 | -9.4pc | |
Shields Gazette | 13,720 | -9.5pc | |
Scarborough Evening News | 9,914 | -9.5pc | |
Coventry Telegraph | 31,064 | -9.6pc | |
Bradford Telegraph & Argus | 24,163 | -9.7pc | |
The Herald, Plymouth | 26,803 | -9.8pc | |
Hartlepool Mail | 12,789 | -9.9pc | |
The Bolton News | 19,740 | -10pc | |
The News, Portsmouth | 37,257 | -10.1pc | |
The Argus Brighton | 22,399 | -10.2pc | |
Lancashire Telegraph | 20,870 | -10.3pc | |
Peterborough Evening Telegraph | 13,834 | -10.5pc | |
Shropshire Star | 49,751 | -10.5pc | |
Birmingham Mail | 42,252 | -10.5pc | |
Sunderland Echo & Football Echo | 29,366 | -10.6pc | |
The Sentinel | 45,343 | -10.7pc | |
Leicester Mercury | 45,465 | -11.1pc | |
Oldham Evening Chronicle | 12,849 | -11.1pc | |
The Journal, Newcastle | 23,291 | -11.4pc | |
Express & Star, Wolverhampton | 100,244 | -11.4pc | |
Bristol Evening Post | 33,784 | -11.9pc | |
Lancashire Evening Post | 20,379 | -12.1pc | |
Wigan Evening Post | 6,213 | -12.4pc | |
Carlisle News and Star (West) | 4,302 | -12.9pc | |
The Gazette, Blackpool | 19,185 | -13.1pc | |
Manchester Evening News | 78,984 | -13.2pc | |
Nottingham Post | 30,648 | -13.3pc | |
The Post, Bristol | 32,996 | -13.9pc | |
Doncaster Star | 1,931 | -17pc | |
Eastern Daily Press | Pending | ||
Norwich Evening News | Pending | ||
East Anglian Daily Times | Pending | ||
Ipswich Evening Star | Pending | ||
Ipswich Star | Pending | ||
Wales | |||
Daily Post, North Wales | 30,585 | -3.8pc | |
The Leader (Wrexham, Flintshire & Chester) | 15,314 | -5.1pc | |
The Western Mail | 25,435 | -5.6pc | |
South Wales Echo | 30,178 | -7.9pc | |
South Wales Argus | 21,437 | -8.1pc | |
South Wales Evening Post | 36,623 | -8.8pc | |
Scotland | |||
Press & Journal, Aberdeen | 68,659 | -3.4pc | |
Dundee Evening Telegraph | 22,496 | -4.8pc | |
Greenock Telegraph | 13,470 | -6.1pc | |
Paisley Daily Express | 6,887 | -8.6pc | |
Dundee Courier & Advertiser | 56,243 | -9.3pc | |
Aberdeen Evening Express | 43,067 | -10pc | |
Edinburgh Evening News | 35,611 | -10.9pc | |
Glasgow Evening Times | 45,942 | -12.3pc | |
Northern Ireland | |||
Irish News | 42,084 | -3.6pc | |
News Letter | 22,198 | -5.5pc | |
Sunday Journal | 2,375 | -7.5pc | |
Belfast Telegraph | 53,847 | -9.2pc | |
Sunday Life | 48,746 | -11.5pc | |
Channel Islands | |||
Guernsey Press & Star | 15,013 | -1pc | |
Jersey Evening Post | 17,912 | -1pc |
Nottingham Post – 30,000 copies per day!
What the hell has been going on there?
Figures are frightening and when 5% drop is good it just confirms your worst fears
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It’s interesting that regional daily circulations are dropping at a much lower rate than the nationals.
This would be the ideal time for regional dailies to remodel themselves on American lines, where metropolitan papers serve as local, national and international news sources.
With the right formula, regional dailies could capitalise on the failings of the ‘Londoncentric’ nationals and produce papers truly relevant to their own readerships.
Unfortunately, many regional operations are burdened down by poor management, where blinkered accountants and former ad reps are in all the top management jobs.
It’s no accident that the Western Morning News is doing so well. It’s a very good paper in which editorial still counts for something. Good luck to them.
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What’s difference between The Post Bristol and Bristol evening Post
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The Nottingham Post now appears to sell only 500 more copies than the Derby Telegraph.
I would guess that in the ‘old days’ the Post outsold the Telegraph by something like two to one. In recent times the Telegraph has overtaken the Post in quality of content, and it seems that pro-rata it has proved more successful in holding on to readers.
The Post always had the feel of a big city newspaper, especially when it was based in the city centre. Its decline, which will surely see it become a weekly if the alarming fall in circulation is not reversed, is for me one of the saddest aspects of the crisis in the newspaper world.
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I think regional dailies are entering the Twilight Zone when ‘success’ is measured by unrelenting, comparative declines in circulation. It’s like watching a string of stricken people hanging on to a cliff face by their fingernails. One by one they drop off – to become weeklies or close – and there is no rescue plan in place. Sad and horrible.
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I was circulation director on the Post in the late nineties, sales were over 100,000 copies a day then!
Must be one of the biggest declines in the business?
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Nottingham Post 30,648 -13.3pc
The Post, Bristol 32,996 -13.9pc
OMG !!!!!!!
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Bob from Burnley suggests we try the “American model” of providing local, national and international news in our regional dailies. No need – just follow the old Nottingham Evening Post model of yesteryear when with ten editions providing just that and beating the nationals with major stories time after time, thanks to the afternoon publication advantage, it sold up to 130,000 copies a night. Even though a survey showed more than 30% of Post readers did not buy a national paper, the “brains” decided a decade or so ago to cut national and international news to just a token amount. OK, the internet revolution would still have hit hard but this and other balmy decisions meant the Post started from a weak position, hence why it is always at the top of the league these days for circulation decline. The tiny staff are working their socks off to try to keep it afloat but just ask former readers why they don’t buy it any more.
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At what point does a daily decide that it’s time to go twice weekly or weekly?
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Bob from Bunley and Ian James, the Shropshire Star provides pages of national, international, celebrity rubbish and sport, as well as a daily TV guide, and it’s still lost more than 10 per cent of its readership. Back to the drawing board on that theory.
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True, Former Hack, the Express and Star does that and its sales are still massive compared with other regionals. Of course, it has been hit by the switch to online but it started from a much stronger position when the internet began to take over. Regional dailies are doomed but the Express and Star will survive for much longer than the others.
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