Post-Dispatch Sunday circulation bucks industry trend, climbs slightly
The St. Louis Post-Dispatch is one of just two among the top 25 Sunday papers to report a circulation increase in the latest period measured by the Audit Bureau of Circulations. The Arizona Republic is the other.
Overall, the nation’s newspapers reported largely gloomy numbers.
According to a story by Business Writer Michael Liedtke of the Associated Press:
The Audit Bureau of Circulations said Monday that average sales of newspapers declined 7.1 percent in the October-March period from the same six-month span in 2007-2008. The comparison is drawn from 395 daily U.S. newspapers that reported in both periods.
It’s the most severe downturn since newspaper circulation began to crumble in the early 1990s. The erosion has been accelerating during the recession of the past 16 months: U.S. newspaper circulation decreased 4.6 percent in the April-September period of 2008 after falling 3.6 percent in the October 2007-March 2008 span.
In the most recent report, 11 of the 25 largest newspapers sustained double-digit declines in average weekday circulation.
The Post-Dispatch’s daily circulation declined 6.5 percent, to 238,400, according to the ABC numbers. The Sunday Post-Dispatch grew 0.3 percent to 415,815 — the 16th largest Sunday circulation in the United States.
“Although that’s a slight gain, it is remarkable in this economic climate,” Managing Editor Pam Maples said in a note to the staff.
“We’re excited to be one of the two largest newspapers in the country that continues to see an increase in Sunday circulation,” Post-Dispatch Publisher Kevin Mowbray says in an article in Tuesday’s paper.
The Associated Press story continues:
While many newspapers have intentionally whittled their circulation by curtailing deliveries in far-flung areas to save money, they also are losing readers who are simply choosing not to buy copies.
Some readers instead are shifting to the free versions of newspapers that most publishers post on their Web sites. That trend helped increase the traffic on newspaper Web sites by 10.5 percent during the first three months of the year, according to a Nielsen Online analysis conducted for the Newspaper Association of America.
But the bigger online audience isn’t generating enough ad sales to overcome the huge losses in print advertising. Several major publishers reported their print ad sales plunged by 25 percent to 35 percent during the first quarter. To make matters worse, online ad revenue also fell at major newspaper publishers such as Gannett Co., The New York Times Co. and McClatchy Co.
Steve Parker is the deputy managing editor for news, and oversees the Post-Dispatch's front page. STLtoday's online news editors are on his newsroom team. Parker has been at the paper since September 1980. 
“The Post-Dispatch’s daily circulation declined 6.5 percent.” When are you people at the PD going to get it? You are a terrible paper. It is getting harder and harder for me to find someone who has read my letters to the editor in the PD. Everyone has canceled the PD. Yet, I wrote a letter to the Kirkwood-Webster Times and everyone has read it. Everywhere I go people are telling me they saw the letter. My spouse couldn’t believe anyone actually read the Kirkwood-Webster Times. Go figure!
You also forgot to mention:
Other than The Wall Street Journal, the only newspaper in the top 25 not to post a decline in circulation
The WSJ has a conservative Editorial Page.
I get the Sunday Post, although at the grocery store instead of delivery.
Hey Centrist,
Do you have a life? Damn dude, it sounds like you hate everything. “It getting harder and harder for me to find someone who has read my letters in the PD.” Damn dude you sound a bit narcissistic. The world doesn’t rotate around you man, most people really don’t care what you think. Your party lost, get over it. If Obama doesn’t straighthen out “W” screw-ups, he’ll be out too. Here’s a idea, try doing something good for your community, instead of sitting at your kitchen table bitching like a whiney 12 yr old.