NRS National Newspaper Round-Up: October 2011 – September 2012

In the latest NRS release for the October 2011 to September 2012 period, the only national daily newspaper to post positive year on year gains was ‘i’.

Daily market

In the popular daily market the Daily Record saw the largest percentage fall, losing 83,000 readers or -9.3%. However, in sheer number terms, The Sun lost over half a million readers, equating to a year on year decline of 7.4%.

The Daily Mirror and Daily Star saw similar declines of 5.8% and 5.6% respectively.

In the mid-market the Daily Mail lost more readers than the Daily Express (-241,000 versus -174,000) but the Daily Mail performance was better in terms of percentage lost against last year’s base. The Daily Mail declined by -5.3% and the Daily Express declined at over twice the rate (-12.1%).

The quality dailies didn’t fare much better. The biggest loser is the Financial Times with a 12.1% loss. The readership of the FT is now under 300,000 but the paper will be much more focussed on other business readership tools rather than the NRS to trade advertising.

The Daily Telegraph was down 190,000 readers (a 12% decline) and The Times and The Guardian lost 125,000 (-8.7) and 57,000 (-5.1%) respectively.

The Independent saw its readership decline by -6.5% or 35,000 readers and now has just over half a million readers. The readership of i has now overtaken The Independent and is the first time that a full year’s data can be compared for the paper. The abridged version now has 561,000 readers – a year on year increase of 137,000 and a third up on last year (+32.3%).

Sunday market

The Sunday market showed The Sunday Times take a significant fall in the quality market, down 212,000 readers (-7.8%), yet still maintaining its lead with just over 2.5 million readers. The Sunday Telegraph, in second place, saw stable readership figures with only a 0.8% drop, whilst the Observer lost 81,000 (-7.1).

Better news for the Independent on Sunday, securing 65,000 readers for the period, a healthy 13.8% leap, but remaining firmly at the bottom of the quality market.

In the Sunday mid-market the Mail on Sunday remained king with just under 4.8 million readers, gaining 93,000 more throughout the year, while the Sunday Express was down 13.1%, losing 200,000 readers.

The newly launched Sun Sunday has no comparable data yet, but has secured a little over 6 million readers showing it as the clear winner in the popular papers. The Sunday Mirror looks stable in second place, down only 1.1% while The People is up 120,000 readers (9.7%) and the Daily Star Sunday up 155,000, an impressive 16.6% increase.