Several double-digit drops in regional daily circulations

Predictably, the latest crop of sales figures for the newsprint versions of regional newspapers show a further slide. And, in several cases, the circulation falls were dramatic.

The figures, showing the average sales for the first six months of 2016, reveal substantial year-on-year losses for every publisher, with many double-digit declines.

It would appear that a 10% fall is now considered something of a success, representing the average level of decline among the daily titles.

Johnston Press’s stable of dailies were among the worst performers. The Wigan Evening Post sold 30.1% fewer copies in the first half of this year compared to the same period in 2015 (but registered a 50% increase in online uniques).

The publisher’s other notable fallers were the Shields Gazette (down 24.8%); Hartlepool Mail (-22.9%); Doncaster Star (-21.3%); Sunderland Echo (-16.9%); Blackpool Gazette (-15.4%); and Postmouth News (-14.2%).

Johnston Press’s flagship, the Scotsman, fell by 14.6% to an average sale across the six months of 20,304. And its Sunday sister, Scotland on Sunday, dropped by 21.1%, selling just over 19,000 copies.

Trinity Mirror, with the largest number of dailies, registered across-theboard decreases. The Birmingham Mail, which has lost many thousands of sales over the past decade, was down by a further 23.8%.

Among TM’s other big losers were the Coventry Telegraph (-22.7%); Liverpool Echo (-19.9%) ; The Post (-16.3%); South Wales Echo (-15.2%); Manchester Evening News (-14.1%); Newcastle Chronicle (-14%); South Wales Evening Post (-13.7%) and Stoke Sentinel (-13.7%).

Newsquest fared a little better. Only nine of its titles recorded double-digit falls, with worst being the Bournemouth Echo (down by 14.7%), Glasgow Evening Times (-14.3%) and the Southern Daily Echo (-13.3%).

Big increases in digital use offered some compensation. Trinity Mirror’s regional network of websites saw a 19.4% increase to 2,471,236 unique daily browsers while the networks of Newsquest and Johnston Press also did well, with a 24.1% rise to 1,575,714 uniques and 22.3% rise to 1,189,674 respectively.