ABCs January 2015: A tough month for newspapers

In what turned out to be a very dry January for newspapers, only a handful of titles recorded any significant circulation growth, according to the latest ABC figures.

Dailies

It was cautious start to the year for daily newspapers with only three publications – the Sun, Daily Mail and the Guardian– recording period on period circulation increases greater than 2%.

The Sun, owned by News UK, achieved a convincing 4.6% growth month on month, a healthy 86,000 extra copies sold. The title also achieved a 10% increase year on year.

The Guardian saw an increase of over 4%, an extra 7,500 copies last month compared to December 2014 and the Daily Mail picked up a further 40,000 sales over the same period.

Other than the Sun, only the Times held on to a Year on Year increase in the daily sector – gaining an extra 12,300 sales compared to January 2014.

Sunday market

The worst hit title in the Sunday sector was the Sunday People, down -1.5%, period on period, recording a loss of more 5,000 copies. The title was down -10.6% year on year.

Keeping the trend going the Sun on Sunday, like it’s daily option, saw the best return over the latest month – a 5.4% increase in sales over the first month of 2015, an increase of over 80,000 copies.

The Sunday Mirror and Sunday Time saw reasonable January increases of 21,000 and 14,000 respectively.

The Sunday market took a hit in all areas year on year with no titles seeing any increase compared to January 2014.

Overall, the Sunday market was up 1.8% in January and down -9.2%, year on year.

London Free Press

City A.M took a bit of a knock in January, dropping -8.6% (-9,800 copies), whilst the London Evening Standard was up 6.4%, dishing out more than 53,000 extra copies as commuters went back to work after the festive break.

The Metro was up just 0.8% in January and overall the London free press was up 2.9%.