Steep Fall in Newspaper Readership

By Ben Aulakh

Some of the biggest newspapers in the United Kingdom have seen their circulation plummet over the last year.

The annual ABC Circulation figures show that every national paper and some of the biggest regional papers have seen a steep fall in readership.

The Daily Telegraph, The Guardian and The Times saw the biggest falls with circulation spiralling down 17 per cent, 15 per cent and 13 per cent respectively at the three titles.

Other dailies taking a serious hit were the Daily Express – down by around nine and a half per cent – and the Daily Mirror, which suffered a seven per cent reduction.

It has been a similar tale of woe for the Sunday quality papers, with The Observer, The Sunday Times and The Sunday Telegraph seeing reductions in readership of 21 per cent, 16 per cent and 10 per cent.

Among the major regional and city titles there have seen serious reductions in the numbers of people purchasing the papers.

The Liverpool Daily Post saw its readership fall by almost a third with 28 per cent fewer readers in the last year; the Doncaster Star was also badly hit with a 17 per cent decline in numbers.

Mark Thomas, Liverpool Daily Post editor, said: "These ABC figures must be examined within the context of the Liverpool Daily Post's repositioning as a business title.

"Over the past 12 months we have implemented a strategy to develop the Liverpool Daily Post's future around a highly-targeted, affluent and niche business audience.

The Nottingham Post suffered an 11 per cent reduction, The Leicester Mercury a 9 per cent fall and the Birmingham Mail underwent a fall of more than 9 per cent in the last 12 months.

Four other city papers saw noticeable decreases, the Liverpool Echo saw a three per cent fall, The Express and Star in the West Midlands declined by five per cent while the Yorkshire Post and Bristol Evening Post both saw reductions of around 6 per cent in the last 12 months.