Exeter's daily Express and Echo newspaper to go weekly

The first weekly edition is to go out on 8 September

A Devon city daily newspaper is to change to a weekly title.

The Express and Echo, which is circulated in the Exeter area, said the move was in response to falling circulation and market changes.

The last daily edition, which sells about 17,000 copies, is due to be published on 2 September with the first weekly going out on 8 September.

Managers at the Northcliffe Media-owned title said everything was being done to avoid compulsory job losses.

Daily editions 'difficult'

Editor Marc Astley said: "We've got a huge and loyal readership still and people still buy the paper on a regular basis.

"But the majority aren't buying it six days a week, so it's difficult to sustain a six-day operation."

He added: "A great sadness of mine is that it will be inevitable that, as part of the change, we will have to make some redundancies.

"Myself and the senior team are extremely sad that we'll be saying goodbye to some of our colleagues."

Remaining staff will be working on producing 200-plus page weekly editions.

Bosses added that news updates would be published through the week on its website.

The announcement comes less than three weeks after the paper's sister title, Torbay and south Devon's Herald Express, moved from a daily to a weekly title.