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for NY News and Post
Both cite reader gains, but will the Post's last?
By Jeff Bercovici
In a world gone topsy-turvy, it's comforting to know that some things never change.
In the newspaper business, that means the New York Post and the New York Daily News are still at war, and, as ever, who's winning depends on who you ask.
In the days following last month's attacks, the Daily News shuttered its free afternoon edition, started last fall as an attempt to steal readers from the Post, a popular subway read.
If it was unsuccessful in that mission, it turns out that at least the Daily News Express, as it was called, did not cannibalize readers from the morning edition of the News, which was a concern at the time.
The Mort Zuckerman-owned paper's daily circulation was up 4.3 percent, to 734,473, in the six months ending Sept. 30, according to the latest figures from the Audit Bureau of Circulations.
Across town, the Rupert Murdoch-owned Post was quick to crow of its far more remarkable gain, a circulation increase of 22 percent, to 533,860.
And it indeed would seem impressive. However it came at some expense, the halving of its newsstand price from 50 cents to 25 cents. That initiative came when Zuckerman debuted his Express.
But by all estimates it was an expensive gesture, and with the Express gone, it is likely that the Post will resume its old newsstand price, which will in turn probably cause most or all of those readership gains to evaporate.
As there are no figures for how much Zuckerman spent on the Express, there's no way of knowing how much the Post is eating from having slashed its cover price in half. One figure floating around is $25 million a year.
Elsewhere in town, The New York Times saw daily circulation increase about 1 percent to 1,109,371. The Times's Sunday circulation fell 0.8 percent to 1,668,650.
Newsday's daily circulation was more or less flat at 577,354, and Sunday circulation was also unchanged, at 675,619.
The Wall Street Journal was up about 1 percent to 1,780,605, making it the second-largest daily overall.
USA Today held onto the No. 1 spot as the nation's top-selling newspaper, even though its Monday-Thursday circulation slipped 0.6 percent, to 2,149,933.
But thanks to the ABC's new rules for counting paid circulation, The Wall Street Journal can still claim to have the most readers who are paying at least 50 percent of the basic price.
Forty-four percent of USA Today's circulation fell into the "Other Paid" category, meaning the reader paid less than 25 percent of the basic rate. For the Journal, that number was only 15.4 percent.
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Newspaper gains and losses |
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| Newspaper |
2001 Circ (Daily) |
2000 Circ (Daily) |
% change |
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USA Today |
2149933 |
2166037 |
-0.74 |
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The Wall Street Journal |
1780605 |
1762749 |
1.01 |
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The New York Times |
1109371 |
1097182 |
1.11 |
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Los Angeles Times |
944303 |
1033401 |
-8.62 |
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Washington Post |
759864 |
756568 |
0.44 |
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New York Daily News |
734473 |
701962 |
4.63 |
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Chicago Tribune |
621305 |
619775 |
0.25 |
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Newsday |
577354 |
576701 |
0.11 |
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Houston Chronicle |
551854 |
546085 |
1.06 |
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New York Post |
533860 |
436796 |
22.22 |
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Source: Audit Bureau of Circulations |
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October 31, 2001 © 2001 Media Life
-Jeff Bercovici is a staff writer for Media Life.
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