Resisting the death spiral

Better judgement and greater commitment to print will ensure its survival, writes Raymond Snoddy

For the last couple of months two new publications coexisted in the UK media market. Apart from being new they could not have been more different and shared only one important characteristic, both chose to launch in print, surely a counter-intuitive thing to do in modern times.

One is no longer with us and as for the other, only time will tell.

The owners of both are to be congratulated for being willing to innovate and try something new in a medium which has no shortage of detractors.

One of course was The New Day from Trinity Mirror which was strangled by its owners after a mere eight weeks of life. The other is Raconteur, a serious current affairs monthly distributed free in central London, and at targeted places where upmarket readers can be found in reasonable concentrations.

The company set up by Swedish publishing entrepreneur Freddie Ossberg also produces specialist reports for insertion in papers such as The Times.

Can anything be learned from the demise of New Day? Does the rapid failure of the first stand-alone national daily in 30 years mean that such a thing will never be tried again?

Probably, but not inevitably so. The i, obviously almost entirely integrated with its parent The Independent during the first phase of its life, suggests otherwise.

The trouble with New Day was there were serious flaws from the outset, compounded by what looks like a pre-determination to cut the losses at a very early stage if things didn’t come up smelling of instant roses.

The unnamed Trinity executive who described it as “a punt” probably captured accurately the level of strategic thinking that went into the launch.

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The name had too much of a whiff of the happy-clappy, and always beware when potential readers say they want more positive stories – that is simply what they tell researchers, they want great stories like everyone else.

It didn’t help that it had to be printed before the Daily Mirror in the schedule which meant that important stories were inevitably missed and the pricing policy was misguided. Newsagents report confusion after the brief free offering was followed first by one price then a very early price rise.

The launch of all new paid-for publications follow a rigid cycle. Promotion and sampling at the beginning equals a large but very temporary initial circulation which then begins to plummet.

You watch until it bottoms out and then the hard work begins to gradually build a stable circulation. Trinity Mirror almost certainly killed the beast off at the bottom – 40,000 – before waiting to see whether a gradual build was possible or not.

It is a very challenging thing to do to launch a new newspaper as the history of everything from Today to the London Daily News suggests.

To have any chance of success you need to devote serious resources in a committed way over at least a year. The easiest way to guarantee failure is to take a half-hearted “punt” and then pull the plug.

If launching national dailies are difficult how about current affairs magazines offering long detailed reads? How high is the demand for articles that range from street justice in Brazil and the recruiters behind jihadi terror to the London housing crisis and the race to become the next director-general of the United Nations?

The key thing is that Raconteur the magazine is free and has low production costs. There are only two members of staff – an editor and art editor – the content is commissioned from freelance writers and journalists.

Around 130,000 copies are distributed at tube stations in the centre of London, via airlines, hotels and at business hubs around the City of London and Canary Wharf.

With work already well under way for the third edition, Raconteur claims the readership is 64 per cent male and the rest female, with more than 60 per cent under 44 years. 87 per cent have a university degree with 44 per cent earning more than £60,000 a year.

The launch is the latest example of the resilience of the free magazine sector with Shortlist on an ABC circulation of 506,000, Stylist 404,000, Sport with 305,000 and Coach with 300,000. If you stir in free newspapers such as Metro, the Evening Standard and City A.M. there is still a mighty amount of print around.

Raconteur is a small but high quality addition to the pile and one that will clearly survive a lot longer than The New Day.

The trouble is it is difficult for those who really believe in the future of print to stand out against the general gloom.

In a soon to be published interview with Will Lewis, chief executive of Dow Jones, in InPublishing magazine Lewis talks about the “mind boggling” levels of engagement and commitment to print copies of the Wall Street Journal – all 1.44 million of them.

His difficulty is how to avoid being swept up in the negative atmosphere of “the death spiral” of more general American newspapers.

Raconteur is a tiny step in the right direction. The New Day could have been another if Trinty Mirror had shown better judgement and greater commitment and courage.

Disclaimer: Raymond Snoddy occasionally writes for Raconteur special reports.