Strong audited circulation result for Herald

News release

May 17, 2005

Strong audited circulation result for seven-day-a-week Herald

New circulation figures released today show the New Zealand Herald is New Zealand’s biggest selling newspaper, and in its maiden audit, the Herald on Sunday has become the third largest circulating paper in the country.

APN says The New Zealand Herald continues to deliver stability in its market leadership with daily sales of 204,549[1] making it more than twice as big as its nearest daily competitor. The Herald on Sunday has performed ahead of expectations with a first audited circulation of 101,355[2].

APN New Zealand CEO Ken Steinke says the introduction of the Herald on Sunday has given Herald readers a newspaper seven days a week.

“Readership patterns have changed and we have adapted to meet those challenges. We’ve achieved this by publishing a newspaper every day, introducing the community magazine The Aucklander and growing our website (www.nzherald.co.nz).

“Not only do our readers have more choice but also by introducing a Sunday paper, APN has gained newspaper sales. As anticipated, the New Zealand Herald is down slightly, but the net result is 60,000 extra newspapers sold each week.

“It’s the kind of market growth we could not have achieved any other way.”

Mr Steinke said the industry circulation audits demonstrated that total Sunday newspaper sales increased by 86,379 year-on-year, growth of 27 percent. This proved that one of APN’s principal objectives, growing the Sunday market, had been achieved.

Mr Steinke says that based on reader feedback, APN New Zealand has also made a number of changes to its newspapers.

“These include increasing the number of news pages in the Herald on Sunday, revamping Sunday View, redeveloping Viva as well as re-launching Weekend Herald’s property section Heraldhomes.

“We’re very happy with the results. We now have an extremely strong portfolio of publications – The NZ Herald, The Weekend Herald, the Herald on Sunday, The Aucklander and the NZ Herald Online – across the daily, weekend, community and online categories.

“Not only have we delivered strong sales results, but also we continue to produce award-winning newspapers. The New Zealand Herald has been leading the news for 141 years dominating the news reporting category at the Qantas Media Awards announced last week (Friday 13 May) with nine journalism awards.

“At that event, APN publications took home more than 20 awards including Best Weekly Newspaper – The Weekend Herald, best sports section – Supersport and best travel section – Travel on Tuesday.”

The Herald on Sunday was also recognised with awards going to the newspaper’s sports editor, Paul Lewis, who won Sports Columnist of the Year while Amanda Spratt took out the award for Junior Feature Writer.

The Herald on Sunday fashion and beauty pages also won Best Newspaper Specialist Page/Section and the paper was a finalist in the award for Best Weekly Newspaper.

“The awards eligibility period closed after the Herald on Sunday had been in the market for only three months so we’re more than pleased with our showing.

“The circulation figures prove the validity of the decision to publish seven-days a week. We just wouldn’t have achieved this sort of market growth without the introduction of the Herald on Sunday.”

To find out more about the NZ Herald visit www.nzherald.co.nz

ENDS

About APN New Zealand

APN News & Media is a successful broad-based media company that publishes New Zealand's leading metropolitan daily newspaper, The New Zealand Herald as well as the Herald on Sunday. Launched in October 2004, the Herald on Sunday is a compact format quality newspaper with a North Island readership.

In addition to the New Zealand Herald and the Herald on Sunday, APN also publishes the community magazines The Aucklander and the Christchurch Star.

A division of APN National Publishing, NZ Magazines owns an expanding range of magazine titles, including The New Zealand Listener, NZ Woman’s Weekly and Crème Magazine.

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