First Draft by Tim Porter

How Papers are Trying to Save Sunday

More people read newspapers on Sundays than any other day of the week. That's the good news.

The bad news is that each year an increasing smaller percentage of the population thinks the big Sunday bundle is worth the bother.

The Newspaper Association of America reports that about two of every three U.S. adults read a Sunday paper, a drop of about 5 percent in the last five years. (Longer timelines show deeper declines: In raw numbers, since 1977 the number of men reading Sunday papers has fallen 17 percent (to 43.3. million) and the number of women 12 percent (48 million).

These numbers, of course, follow the trendline of daily readership, which now hovers just above 50 percent of adults.

Editor & Publisher reports that in response to the drop-off in Sunday readership "editors are shaking up content, attempting to find the right mix for the modern, time-challenged reader -- eliminating some features, and tweaking or dramatically revising others."

Here are some highlights from the E&P story, an overview that doesn't address why readers are giving up on Sunday and what, if anything, is working to retain them.

 Sunday magazines: Fewer than 20 newspapers publish them, down from 50 in 1981. Some make money, most don't. Some publishers don't care. Says Dirk Van Susteren of the tiny (circulation 22,096) Rutland (Vt.) Herald, "Our surveys have indicated it is a popular section. People like the style of writing, the bigger pieces. ... You can't look at it from a profit point of view. Does page A-1 make a profit?"

 Book review sections: Only six papers publish them. Most of the national goes, not unexpectedly, to the New York Times. Says Marie Arana, editor of the Washington Post's Book World: "Book reviews garner only about 30% of the readership, which is low compared to the A-section or style section. But the percentage of readers who will actively buy from the book section is greater."

 Travel sections: They're doing more "close-to-home" stories and still paying freelancers lousy rates - $100 to $300 a story but also demanding that travel writers pay their own way. Says freelancer Mike Whye, president of the Midwest Travel Writers Association,: "Some papers, and I won't name them, have a 'don't ask, don't tell' policy - which is very kind of them, really, because without (sponsored) travel, the travel-writing market would just flat die."

 Comics: E&P writer Dave Astor says "surveys show the comics section remains one of the most-read parts of the Sunday paper," but doesn't cite one. Comics are smaller, tightened up to save newsprint, and less appealing to advertisers. The quote I want to see but is not in the story is the one that supports this statement: "Some theorize that text-oriented editors don't believe the comics are that important or are jealous of their popularity compared to, say, editorials."

 Television books: Says Ted Massing of the Kansas City Star, "Traditionally, [TV sections] don't make money. They're circulation-driving pieces." Still, the proliferation of channels is making them harder to produce and many are run by ad departments. Readers love them, says Kyrie O'Connor, AME/features at the Hartford Courant. She says, "The three things in a newspaper that you can never mess with are the TV book, the comics and the puzzles. If you're going to do anything at all with those, you'd better know what you're doing."

Links
 Editor & Publisher Sunday Sections Evolve to Lure More Readers

Posted by Tim Porter at August 29, 2003 08:18 AM