Understanding newspapers’ confidence on cover price increase
Last week, various national newspapers increased their cover price by about 37 percent. The Punch, Nation, Vanguard and Daily Sun had jerked up their cover prices from N150 per copy, citing high operational costs occasioned by escalating price of newsprint and other consumables.
For instance, Daily Sun said “We are constrained to announce an upward review of our cover price from N150 to N200 with effect from Monday, March 28, 2016”. In the same vein, Punch increased its cover price from N150 to N200. It said “We appreciate that times are hard, but we are constrained to increase the cover price because of the huge rise in the cost of production over the months, a direct consequence of the current economic challenges”
Vanguard said “Due to skyrocketing prices of newsprint and printing consumables, we have come to the painful conclusion to slightly raise our cover price to N200 for week days and N250 for weekends.
According to the Nation which increased its cover price from N150 to N200 for weekdays said, “The economy is in turmoil. Prices of practically all valuable items have skyrocketed. Foreign exchange to bring in essential materials for production is hard to come by. The exchange rate has spiraled out of control. Many manufacturing concerns are producing far below their installed capacities and jobs are threatened.
“Our industry is hard hit as most production materials are imported. With forex difficult to source, there is scarcity of production materials, particularly newsprint. Expectedly, the prices of the limited quantity available have soared astronomically. We have absorbed the huge extra cost in our resolve to serve you, our most esteemed readers. We have no other desire than to serve you most faithfully, timely, unobtrusively and in a most robust manner. But the reality of the times demands that few adjustments be made in our collective interest”
This development, against prediction of the near dead of print industry over emergence of social media, is rather a sign of confidence by publishers that the industry will continue to thrive.
With the price increase, the print media industry is sure of its worth, credibility and continued patronage by readers and advertisers even in the face of believed social media threat.
This confidence was justified recently when a report by Nielsen Global Trust published in Bizcommunity website stated that larger percent of 30,000 respondents in 60 countries still place most of their trust in more traditional forms of communication/advertising. “This is evidenced by the fact that the second highest number of respondents in the survey, said they trust editorial content such as newspaper articles”
Nielsen South Africa Head of Media Candice Ulrich comments; “It’s clear that while there isn’t one simple rule for maximizing advertising effectiveness, understanding how consumers feel about the ads served on the various media platforms they use every day is a good place to start.”
Some analysts said that though newspapers are contending with online publications but believed that the increase in cover price is not frightening enough to act as disincentive to newspaper readers.
Bayo Elegbe, a media analyst and CEO of Sponge, a digital platform said the increase is understandable due to high cost of raw materials for the production of newspapers. “ It makes sense that the publishers increase their cover price”, he said.
In his comment, Akonte Ekine, a public relations practitioner based in Lagos who also justified the increase said media houses do not exist in isolation in the society. “They are affected by everything that is affecting other organizations. This is a reflection of the times”, he said.
Also assessing the development, Tola Bademosi, the CEO of BD Consult, a PR firm believed that the increase may cause a drop in circulation as some readers may switch to digital.
He however said that nobody can blame the newspapers as cost of production has gone up “as they need to break even in their businesses”
Daniel Obi