Changing consumption patterns of Welsh news

The latest circulation figures for the Welsh newspapers have recently been published and shown in Table 1 below. The figures are for the first half of 2013, compared with the same period last year. More detail is available from ABC by entering the name of the paper in the Certificate Finder search box.

Table 1: Welsh newspaper daily circulation – for first half of 2013

Newspaper	Readership	% paid for	% fall in circulation compared with first half of 2012
Wrexham Leader	14,322	100	6.5
Western Mail	23,723	94.6	6.7
North Wales Daily Post	28,331	100	7.4
South Wales Argus	19,748	100	7.9
S0uth Wales Echo	27,700	100	8.2
South Wales Evening Post	33,479	98.2	8.6
Wales on Sunday	23,416	100	12.4

Source: Hold the Front Page, 28 August 2013

There’s nothing particularly remarkable about any of these figures. They simply show a continuation of the same general decline in printed newspaper circulation that has been apparent for some years. Only one newspaper in the whole of the UK has managed to buck the trend.

But it isn’t all doom and gloom. The real question is whether people are getting the same news from the web editions of these newspapers instead and, thankfully, that information is also available. Table 2 gives the Welsh figures:

Table 2: daily unique browsers for web editions of Welsh newspapers for first half of 2013

Website	Daily unique browsers	% increase compared with first half of 2012
www.southwales-eveningpost.co.uk	24,362	46
www.walesonline.co.uk	63,972	16.7
www.dailypost.co.uk	17,973	14.6

Source: Hold the Front Page, 28 August 2013

Again, the figures are for the first half of 2013, compared with the same period last year. Across the UK, all but four of the newspaper websites showed an increase. These figures aren’t directly comparable with the print figures – for example the WalesOnline figure will include combined content from the Western Mail, the South Wales Echo and Wales on Sunday. However, all in all, the increase in online readership more than compensates for the loss of print readership, which is encouraging and healthy from the point of view of informing the public about news and current affairs. Table 3 shows the relative gain three newspaper groups made when comparing their online gains with their print losses

Table 3: Gains and loses of newspaper print and online editions, for first half of 2013

Newspaper	Print loss	Online gain	Difference
South Wales Evening Post	2,835	7,676	4,841
Western Mail/South Wales Echo/Wales on Sunday	7,493	9,155	1,662
North Wales Daily Post	2,264	2,289	25

But there are still questions to be asked. For example I think that people who buy a printed paper are likely to read all or most of its content. On the other hand online readership will tend to be more focused on fewer pages. And of course there is also the question of how to make money from online editions … especially when people (like me) block the advertisements.