Simon Marquis to quit as NRS chairman

The National Readership Survey (NRS) has announced that Simon Marquis will be stepping down as chairman of the board at the end of the year.

The news comes just six months after the Newspaper Publishers’ Association (now the NMA) served notice on the NRS as it seeks a contemporary audience measurement system.

The aim of the review is to introduce a new audience measurement system for published media brands covering all major routes to market – including print, mobile, tablets, PCs and laptops.

Last week the first phase of the formal process, which being led by ex-Mindshare boss Jed Glanvill, saw a ‘small number of bidders’ make it through to the next phase of the review.

“In light of the full-scale review of the audience measurement system now under way, it seems only right to make way for new blood and a new system of governance for this important media sector,” Marquis said.

“The NRS board has asked me to stay on until the end of 2015 to help effect a smooth handover which I am very happy to do, and of course I wish the newsbrands, the magazines and the agencies every success in the creation of a brand new measurement system.”

Under Marquis’s tenure the NRS survey has witnessed the transition from print only, to one that provides in-depth measurement across print, online and mobile channels for the industry’s larger titles.

Marquis will continue to serve in his role as chairman of The NRS until December 2015.