The Daily Mirror has launched a summer marketing attack on its main tabloid rival with a Sun Protection campaign.
Copies of the Daily Mirror with a specially printed cover were distributed in London locations this morning. They can be folded to create a “sun protection” hat. Branded lip balms are also being given away carrying the words: “Sun Protection. Read the Intelligent Tabloid”.
The latest marketing wheeze from the Mirror follows an “Eclipse of The Sun” ad run on billboards in March trumpeting the fact that the Mirror has more readers in print and online that The Sun, according to the National Readership Survey.
In July, sales of the Daily Mirror fell 10.5 per cent year on year to 856,499 – according to ABC. The Sun averaged more than double this figure with 1,856,790 per day – down 9.8 per cent year on year.
The Sun’s website paywall means that the Mirror has far more readers for its free website.
According to the NRS, the Daily Mirror had a combined print/digital readership of 22.9m per month in the year to March 2015 versus 13.6m for The Sun in the same period.
A Sun spokesperson said: "They should spend more time taking a long hard look in The Mirror and contrast their recent stories with the exclusives in The Sun.
"In July The Sun and Sun on Sunday recorded the biggest sales increase of any newspapers, the daily paper now averaging a million more paid sales than the Daily Mirror.
"Perhaps their staff and readers would prefer it if they invested in actual journalism, rather than embarrassing stunts."
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