The Birmingham Post might cease daily publication after 152 years, becoming the first flagship newspaper of a large city to go weekly in response to the recession and competition from online media.
Sorry, but this Financial Times lead misses the point.
Birmingham is a city with more than one million people (three million if you include the metro area).
The reach of this paper is minimal.
The circulation of the Birmingham Post dropped from 18,500 to 12,700 since 2000, according to the Audit Bureau of Circulations.
Why?
Because it is a bad local paper.
Period.
Please, let’s be serious.
The Internet doesn’t kill good newspapers.
Just the bad ones.
Papers with no voice.
No audience.
No business.
Image: Meeting of the Birmingham Political Union (1832-1833), oil on canvas, by Benjamin Haydon
By Marc Reeves - Jul 12, 2009 | Leave a reply
“Because is a bad local paper” (sic)
Yeah, thanks, Juan, for your insight. Do you genuinely think the Post is a bad paper, or do you have a theory that only bad papers are challenged at the moment, and therefore the Post must fit into this category?
Perhaps you could ‘be serious’ for a moment?
I’d be interested in your critique of my paper’s quality, please. What’s your view on our content, our design, our relevance to our target audience?
Let me know if you’d like me to send you some copies.
Regards,
Marc Reeves
Editor
Birmingham Post
By Juan Antonio Giner - Jul 12, 2009 | Leave a reply
Dear Marc,
This is nothing personal.
I am sorry for you and your team, but it seems that your current owner, the Trinity Mirror Group, is not ready to invest more money in a print product that has not enough readers and advertisers to stay in business.
I know very well your paper and, thank you, you don’t need to send me any copies.
Your recent redesign was excellent (Ally Palmer and Terry Watson have redesigned newspapers for some of our clients).
But perhaps the strategic editorial direction to focus the paper on “the wealth creators and policy makers of the West Midlands, the traditional manufacturing heartland of the UK” has failed, and the good numbers are not in your side.
I read today in your website the story about the new Jaguar and for me the most interesting part was this comment from one of your readers published a few days ago when you reported that “Jaguar Land Rover made a loss of £281 million in the first 10 months after it was taken over by Indian firm Tata Motors”
“JLR are producing cars that nobody wants to buy in sufficient numbers to make any sort of money.
What Jaguar need right now is a small quality premium car that will fit in between the BMW 1 & 3 series category, with low emissions and running costs.
But what are they about to launch?
A £50k XJ that very few people will want.”
Oh boy, you must have a few readers, but they are smart.
Yes, many print newspapers still have the feeling that the “eat your spinach, it’s good for you!” approach works.
Perhaps like Jaguar, you are producing an excellent newspaper “that nobody wants to buy in sufficient numbers to make any sort of money.”