Other publishers may be seeing the freefall slowdown and ad agencies may expect a turnaround next year, but there’s little let-up for local newspaper publisher Newsquest. April-to-June income was 36.9 percent less than a year ago, US parent Gannett (NYSE: GCI) says.
Classified ad sales were decimated by 45.2 percent from last year (seemingly by more than competitors have seen), retail ads by 20.1 percent and national ads by 10.5 percent. Still, these freefalls were actually better than those seen in Q1, Gannett says.
Look inside Newsquest’s classifieds collapse for some good economic indicators – job ads down most by 55.6 percent, property by 52.7 percent, cars by 43.5 percent.
Compounding the problem for Gannett, the pound-dollar exchange rate is more than a fifth lower than last year – and Newsquest is performing worse than its parent’s US stablemates, whose revenue is down less, by 27.2 percent. Gannett as a whole swung back to profit (see paidContent.org’s article).
Newsquest publishes about 317 local papers and 180 websites, which clocked seven million uniques – a seemingly small number for such a large portfolio.