Ad revenue is falling fast for newspaper publishers

According to a report from the New York Times, USA Today's ad revenue fell 14% from February 2006 to February 2007, and The New York Times Company revenue fell 6%. McClatchy and The Tribune companies both reported drops of 5%. Gannett, USA Today's parent company reported an overall advertising slide of 3%.

“I’m reluctant to say that a single data point is a trend,” said Barry Parr, a media analyst at Jupiter Research (via The New York Times). “But those are scary numbers, especially when we’re not in a recession.”

Other analysts agree that it is probably too soon to completely write off newspaper advertising, however, the sharp declines for multiple newspaper companies is alarming.

“It’s fundamental, what’s going on with newspapers,” said Mark Fratrik, an economist with BIA Financial Network. “The younger groups, the most desired demographics, are just not reading them. They aren’t listening to traditional radio either, but I tell radio broadcasters that they’re lucky not to be in newspapers.”

One bright spot is the newspapers' online revenues are up over the same February to February period. Online revenue was up 31% ($2.7 billion) according to industry report. However, since online revenue only accounts for 5% of all newspaper ad revenue, the gains may not be large enough. This could be an indicator, though, that newspapers may have life on the web.

Tags: newspaper advertising, newspaper revenue, online advertising, online revenue