I’ve been following newspaper circulation stats for a few years now. At this point, my big takeaway is that they rejigger the circulation formula so often that any “trend” a layperson spots is as likely to be an artifact of the rejiggering as something real.
Total print and digital circulation was 79,958 Sunday and 74,563 daily. Circulation totals measure paid or verified newspapers delivered and purchased and digital subscriptions.
Sunday circulation declined by 8.8 percent and daily circulation by 9.9 percent. Nearly 60 percent of the Sunday decline and nearly half the daily decline resulted from ABC rules changes on digital access and included the T&G’s early adoption of more stringent ABC requirements before the new rules went into effect, said Tony Simollardes, T&G director of readership and circulation.
Fueled largely by increases in digital circulation and branded editions, daily circulation for the 618 newspapers reporting comparable multiday averages rose .68 percent.
T&G daily circulation stats:
- Oct 2006-March 2007: 84,754
- Oct 2007-March 2008: 81,437
- Oct 2008-March 2009: 78,479
- Oct 2009-March 2010: 71,034
- Oct 2010-March 2011: 79,168*
- Oct 2011-March 2012: 74,563*
There’s an interesting case to be made that focusing on raw numbers in the information economy is only one option, and perhaps not the most fun option. It’s definitely the business the T&G is in, though.