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Nov ABCs: Guardian benefits from Indy price-rise woes

By Dominic Ponsford

The Guardian was the only daily national newspaper to grow UK paid-for sales year-on-year in November.

The FT was able to claim a headline circulation rise – but mainly due to increasing its bulk give-away copies. In the UK its paid-for sales were slightly down.

The Independent’s £1 price tag appears to have cost it dearly in terms of sales – which dropped 13.8 per cent year-on-year in November.

The paper increased its price in September – making it 20p dearer than The Guardian and The Times and 10p more expensive than The Daily Telegraph.

The Independent’s woes appear to have been good news for The Guardian – which may have picked up some disgruntled Indy readers. Its sale was up year-on-year for the first time in many months – at 358,379, up 0.45 per cent.

When free bulk distribution is taken out of the picture, the Independent’s circulation in November was 165,222.

The Independent is planning to lease office space from Associated Newspapers, leaving its Docklands home, in a bid to save costs. Last month it also announced plans to cut 90 jobs (mainly from editorial) at the Independent titles.

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The Financial Times was the only other national daily to record a headline ABC increase sales in November – despite increasing its cover price by 20 per cent to £1.80 in the tail end of the audit period.

The FT‘s overall circulation figure was up 0.8 per cent year-on-year to 448,523 copies a day.

But its UK paid-for circulation (excluding bulk give aways) was 103,770, down from 104,879 in November 2007. The rest of the FT’s circulation is in Asia, Europe, the USA and Middle East.

Although the Daily Star was down year-on-year – its price cut to 20p helped it grow sales month by 2.5 per cent to 714,192.

The Standard increased its circulation year-on-year mainly by boosting the number of bulk give-away copies to 126,267 last month from 95,092 in the same period last year.

National dailies:

Daily Mirror: 1,400,206, down 7.8 per cent

Daily Record: 361,857, down 8.1 per cent

Daily Star: 714,192, down 5.2 per cent

Daily Sport: 77,964, N/A

The Sun: 3,045,899, down 2.5

Daily Express: 752,181, down 1.9 per cent

Daily Mail: 2,193,715, down 5.7 per cent

The Daily Telegraph: 835,497, down 5.3 per cent

Financial Times: 448,523, up 0.8 per cent

The Herald: 62,749, down 8.5 per cent

The Guardian: 358,379, up 0.45 per cent

The Independent: 201,113, down 13.8 per cent

The Scotsman: 50,205, down 6.9 per cent

The Times: 621,831, down 2.4 per cent

Racing Post: 61,678, down 7.7 per cent

Evening Standard: 303,049, up 3.8 per cent

Free newspaper distribution:

Metro: 1,359,954, up 12.3 per cent

London Lite: 401,031, up 0.39 per cent

Thelondonpaper: 500,505, up 0.93 per cent

City AM: 97,116, up 0.21 per cent

Herald AM: 73,067, down 4.52 per cent

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