Flagship Regional Titles See Fall In Sales
The Manchester Evening News is the country’s biggest-selling regional newspaper, according to the latest figures released by the Audit Bureau of Circulations (ABC) this week. The Manchester daily title takes the top spot from the Birmingham Evening Mail, which has been suspended by the ABC following the discovery that it was reporting false circulation figures (see ABC Suspends Birmingham Titles).
Trinity Mirror’s Belfast Telegraph, which comes in third place here, is currently up for sale by the group (see Final Three Suitors Line Up For Belfast Telegraph). Further details on the bidding are expected to by announced along with Trinity Mirror’s financial results, due on Thursday this week.
The majority of the flagship titles are showing declining circulations according to these figures. This is in line with the sharpest fall sales for four years across the whole regional newspaper sector. The Newspaper Society is currently campaigning hard to increase the profile of regional newspapers to national advertisers (see Feature: Regional Publishers Must Work Hard To Attract National Advertisers).
| Top 10 Regional Newspapers By Circulation | ||||
| Title | Jul 98-Dec 98 | Jul 99-Dec 99 | Actual Change | % Change |
| Manchester Evening News (Mon-Fri) | 173,446 | 173,179 | -267 | -0.2 |
| Liverpool Echo | 157,999 | 155,920 | -2,079 | -1.3 |
| Belfast Telegraph | 124,530 | 117,207 | -7,323 | -5.9 |
| Irish Times (Dublin) | 111,729 | 113,835 | 2,106 | 1.9 |
| Glasgow – Evening Times (Mon-Fri) | 116,486 | 108,838 | -7,648 | -6.6 |
| Newcastle Evening Chronicle | 109,685 | 107,511 | -2,174 | -2.0 |
| Newcastle-Upon-Tyne Sunday Sun | 112,918 | 106,342 | -6,576 | -5.8 |
| Leicester Mercury | 108,793 | 105,985 | -2,808 | -2.6 |
| Evening Herald (Dublin) | 103,563 | 105,386 | 1,823 | 1.8 |
| Aberdeen Press & Journal | 104,548 | 100,421 | -4,127 | -4.0 |
| Source: ABC | ||||
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