Strib: Plunging to Irrelevancy
Posted by Andy on October 30th, 2006
No onder the Strib is so excited about the growth downtown, they are planning more hotels, and hotels are great for padding those subscription numbers. The Strib is going to need them to continue charging premium prices for ad space.
NEW YORK Here are the top 25 daily newspapers in the U.S. by circulation (with percent change) for the six-month period ending September 2006.
USA Today: 2,269,509, (-1.3%)The Wall Street Journal: 2,043, 235, (-1.9%)
The New York Times: 1,086,798, (-3.5%)
Los Angeles Times: 775,766, (-8.0%)
The New York Post: 704,011, +5.3%
Daily News, New York: 693,382, +1.0%
The Washington Post: 656,297, (-3.3%)
Chicago Tribune: 576,132, (-1.7%)
Houston Chronicle: 508,097, (-3.6%)
Newsday: 413,579, (-4.9%)
The Arizona Republic, Phoenix: 397,294, (-2.5%)
The Boston Globe: 386,415, (-6.7%)
The Star-Ledger, Newark, N.J.: 378,100, (-5.5%)
San Francisco Chronicle: 373,805, (-5.3%)
The Star Tribune, Minneapolis: 358,887, (-4.1%)
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution: 350,157, (-3.4%)
The Plain Dealer, Cleveland: 336,939, (-0.6%)
The Philadelphia Inquirer: 330,622, (-7.5%)
Detroit Free Press: 328,628, (-3.6%)
The Oregonian, Portland: 310,803, (-6.8%)
The San Diego Union-Tribune: 304,334, (-3.1%)
St. Petersburg (Fla.) Times: 288,676, (-3.2%)
The Orange County (Calif.) Register: 287,204, (-3.7%)
The St. Louis Post-Dispatch: 276,588, +0.6%
The Sacramento (Calif.) Bee: 273,609, (- 5.4%)
Down 4.1% in 6 months and they keep on digging. There is time to save your paper, but you need to start right now by being fair, balkanced, and unpredictable. Right now, there is no reason for conservatives, (who make up a significant portion of Minnesota and thus your potential subscribers) to buy your stinking paper.
Only a fool pays for something that does nothing more than insult his intelligence on a daily basis. Can you stand another 4.1% loss in the next 6 months? And keep in mind this has been during one of the most intense political climates this state has seen. These numbers should be the evidence you need to see you need to CHANGE THE WAY YOU DELIVER THE NEWS.
October 30th, 2006 at 12:25 pm
We get a call or someone door to door about every two weeks trying to get us to subscribe. Now their pitch is just sunday–”don’t you want the ads and coupons?” Pathetic.
October 30th, 2006 at 12:36 pm
Somewhere in my archives is a post on an argument I got into about the content with the sales man who called to get me back after I cancelled. It was really really pathetic. It was the same old, well, you should think like us.