The “subscriber-first” strategy Freedom Communication Inc. started a year ago has yet to bear fruit in terms of total paid circulation for the print edition of its flagship Orange County Register.
Circulation for the print edition declined over the past year—a period in which the daily newspaper continued to add new hires, sections and other resources, including a bolstered roster of community weeklies.
The publication’s self-reported circulation figures for the six months ending on Sept. 30 were released last week by the Alliance for Audited Media in Arlington Heights, Ill.
The Register’s average Monday-through-Friday circulation, counting home delivery and single-copy sales of its print edition, fell by about 10,000, to 149,580, according to the data. That’s down 6% from a year earlier, and 5% from the prior reporting period in March.
Sunday Slip
The average circulation for the Sunday edition fell by about 26,000 to 267,121. The dip came to nearly 10% from a year earlier and 6% from the March reporting period.
Executives at Santa Ana-based Freedom, which is privately held and does not disclose financial data, did not return repeated calls for comment.
The data showing declines in the Register’s daily and Sunday circulation are just a portion of the most recent report. The Alliance for Audited Media also tracks information on digital subscriptions and “branded editions”—an industry term for community weeklies or other publications owned by publishers of daily newspapers.
The Register has put an emphasis on its weeklies, converting a couple to five days a week and billing all of them as supplements to the daily publication that provide added local coverage and advertising.
The data on digital subscriptions and community newspapers are relatively recent additions to the repertoire of the Alliance for Audited Media, which was formerly known as the Audit Bureau of Circulations. They are among various changes to the report that reflect shifts in the industry, with digital subscriptions growing in importance and some publishers cutting frequency of print editions to less than five days.
The new rules make it difficult to directly compare one newspaper versus another—or against its own prior performance. A spike in digital subscriptions, for example, could be cited as offsetting a loss in print readership—an argument that might be oversimplified in terms of understanding the overall affect of the change.
The Register differs from most newspapers because it set out a clear strategy that ties all of its circulation to the print product. The newspaper offers one basic type of subscription, which includes the print edition and access to the digital edition. A subscriber can opt out of the print edition, but will not get a reduction in the price.
In any case, the strategy makes it easier to assess the Register’s total reach in the marketplace, since print and digital subscriptions are, for the most part, one and the same.
The strategy also puts an emphasis on keeping or increasing revenue from circulation in the face of the steady declines in print advertising that have been roiling the newspaper industry for several years and are expected to continue for the foreseeable future.
The Register hiked its subscription prices last year, taking the 7-day home delivery rate from an average of $364 to $416 annually, according to the Alliance for Audited Media report. Executives have since pushed a “dollar-a-day” pricing strategy, with a $365 annual charge for new subscribers. The publication also has been offering revewals to former subscribers at $500 a year.
The aggressive push for higher subscription rates could be giving the Register higher revenue from circulation even as its total number of subscribers drops.
The publication’s executives’ lack of comment on the recent circulation numbers followed a recent skein of publicity garnered by Publisher Aaron Kushner, whose Boston-based 2100 Trust LLC bought Freedom last year. Kushner made public appearances and pronouncements when Freedom launched the Long Beach Register, a Monday-through-Friday daily delivered with the Orange County Register to subscribers there.
Riverside Deal
Kushner also stepped into the spotlight last month when Freedom struck a deal to acquire the Press-Enterprise, a daily newspaper in Riverside County, from Dallas-based A.H. Belo Corp. for $27.3 million.
Circulation figures for the Press-Enterprise daily in Riverside did not look very promising, either, in the recent report. Its Monday-through-Friday average 6% from a year earlier to 81,145. Sunday subscriptions fell 6% to 104,494.
