Printed newspapers debunk predictions of demise

David Chavern

Print remains the primary focus of most U.S. newspapers, partly because the vast majority of them are weeklies, mostly in rural areas. But daily newspapers are still doing well with print, debunking predictions of the medium's demise, writes David Chavern, president of the News Media Alliance, formerly the Newspaper Association of America, the main trade group for dailies.

"Last year, the estimated total U.S. daily newspaper circulation reached 35 million Americans for weekday delivery and 38 million for Sunday," Chavern writes. "It is an audience that not only believes in the importance of journalism, but also understands that print is a pretty good technology. It is readable in all sorts of ambient light, needs no batteries and is incredibly efficient at delivering a wide array of information. (I still contend that there is nothing yet online that is as efficient at key information delivery as a scan across a front page of a print newspaper.)"

Print is also a good advertising value, Chavern writes: "When you advertise in a print newspaper, it ends up in the hands of a trusting and vast audience, with 74 percent of readers trusting the print newspaper compared to the 49 percent who put their trust in Twitter. Online news articles are read for an average of 30 seconds—how much time do those flash-readers really spend looking and interacting with advertisements? Milliseconds? Compare that to print, which sits in readers hands for an average of 40 minutes, daily." Last year, most U.S. newspaper subscribers only read them in print.

Chaven concludes, "The bottom line is that the industry we represent is, first and foremost, in the news business – and the audience for our journalism is larger than it has ever been in history. We deliver news to people in every way they want to consume it. Some want digital, some want print and a whole bunch of people want both. No one should be too quick to tell audiences how they should consume their news – and we should all expect a large segment of our audience to enjoy the ease and efficiency of a print product for some time to come."