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June 21, 2011updated 22 Jun 2011 5:52pm

Lack of ads not readers has killed the daily Torquay Herald Express

By Dominic Ponsford1

Northcliffe’s decision to take the Torquay Herald Express from daily to weekly has little to do with the decline of newspapers but instead marks a new, alarming phase in the now three-year-old economic downturn.

It must be particularly galling for editor Andy Phelan and his team of journalists – who had done their job admirably. Theirs was one of the better-performing daily newspapers in the country circulation-wise – selling 21,112 copies a day, down a relatively respectable 3.7 per cent year on year.

The daily Herald Express is not closing because of any journalistic failing, or because of the digital revolution. It is going weekly because there were no longer the ads to fill it over six days a week. And because the recession is deeper and darker in places like Torquay in the South West of England than the London-based media may realise.

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