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March 23, 2005updated 22 Nov 2022 2:49pm

FT distributes 70,000 free copies of budget special

By Press Gazette

By Dominic Ponsford

The Financial Times claimed to reach more readers than ever with its Budget coverage last week, according to internal estimates.

The Budget day special is the FT’s biggest sale of the year – and
last year it achieved a 100,000 boost to 231,962 in the UK. This year
FT.com achieved a 10 per cent boost in traffic on the day of the Budget
– helped by an interactive Budget income calculator.

For the
first time, the FT published a free full-colour tabloid on the day of
the Budget, called Budget Briefing, which was distributed free of
charge in London just hours after Chancellor Gordon Brown had finished
his speech.

Some 70,000 copies were delivered by motorbikes and Smart cars to commuter points around the city.

An
FT spokesman said: “The aim was to provide instant reaction to the
Budget, but also to promote the FT’s special coverage on the following
day and in the Weekend FT.”

Some 40,000 copies of the FT’s
Budget-special newspaper on 17 March were distributed to five-star
hotels, firstclass Eurostar passengers and businessclass plane
passengers, sponsored by computer company Oracle.

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The FT said advertising for its combined print and online budget specials was the highest ever, at £528,000.

FT
editor Andrew Gowers said: “The fact that we can publish a special
evening tabloid edition and follow it up the next day with the in-depth
comment and analysis you’d expect from the FT is testament to the
seamless way our journalists work across print and online media.”

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