Painful end of year for Evening Standard as sales slide

by Daniel Farey-Jones,, Brand Republic 14-Jan-05, 14:20

LONDON - A taster of free newspaper competition to come gave the Evening Standard a hangover in December, with its circulation down over 6% from November to less than 350,000 copies.

Associated Newspaper's paid-for London title saw just more than 23,000 readers jump ship, possibly to its free Standard Lite edition, which was launched in the middle of the month. With sales standing at 347,523, the paid-for Standard is 6.29% down on November.

With Richard Desmond's free afternoon title looming in the near distance, following the news earlier this week that Metro's distribution deal with London Underground is no longer to be exclusive, the Standard faces more falls in the future.

This is speculation that the Standard could end up as a free title, according to analysts.

Following tradition, December brought falls across the newspaper market, but ABC figures cover only effective publishing days and are not distorted by the presses taking days off.

The tabloids continued their downward spiral, led by the Daily Star, down 4.25% to 810,238. The Daily Record followed, down 3.22% to 452,357, then the Daily Mirror, down 2.7% to 1,700,902. The Sun was least affected but still down 1.82% to 3,180,141.

Year-on-year, the Mirror was the biggest red-top faller, down a whopping 8.38%, almost double the Sun's 4.37%, giving Trinity Mirror chief executive Sly Bailey something to ponder.

In the mid market, the Daily Express did well, putting on 0.69% to 898,697, with Associated's flagship Daily Mail suffering, down 3.51% to 2,318,824. Year-on-year, the Mail was on top, down 2.31% compared with the Express's 3.91%.

The Financial Times notched up the only rise in the quality market, climbing 0.6% to 427,808, but year-on-year was down a mild 1.92%.

The Times hit a bump in the road after its conversion to tabloid earned it a good November. It was down in December by 4.35% to 652,442, but up 4.32% on the year.

Fellow tabloid The Independent declined 3.71% to 252,552, and The Guardian was down further by 4.61% to 359,891 and had a bad overall year, down 3.76% compared to the Indie's 14.96% market grab.

The new management at The Daily Telegraph should be able to stomach its fall of 1.35% to 904,647, holding its head above the 900,000 level.

In Scotland, The Herald was down 2.86% to 77,336 and The Scotsman down 4.76% to 64,986.

The performance of the Sunday titles saw the falls of the dailies repeated.

The Sunday Mirror lost 3.44% to 1,537,006, while the Sunday Express fell 6.75% to 928,839 and The Mail on Sunday fell 7.77% to 2,335,266.

The Telegraph Group again suffered least, with its Sunday broadsheet down 0.99% to 687,435. Its rivals The Sunday Times was down 4.3% to 1,304,919; The Observer was down 5.66% to 433,934; and the Independent on Sunday was down 3.58% to 204,358.

The biggest Sunday faller was Scotland on Sunday, down 11.65% to 73,711, and the biggest riser was Desmond's Daily Star Sunday, up 11.64% to 521,869.

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