Herald and Times Group reports small rise in sales

The National, campaigning for Scottish independence, has had sales averaging 16,900 this year

The Glasgow-based Herald group of newspapers has reported a small growth in sales of its main titles in the year to June.

Including digital subscriptions to the Herald and Sunday Herald, average seven-day sales were up 2%.

Its new title, The National, launched in November and campaigning for Scottish independence, has had sales recently averaging 16,900 this year.

That helped raise combined print sales and digital subscriptions across the group's titles, which also include the Evening Times, by 20% over the past year to more than 91,000.

The independence cause helped raise sales of the Sunday Herald by more than a third during the second half of last year. It was the only national title to give full editorial backing to the 'yes' campaign.

The average weekly circulation fell back in the first half of this year from 32,200 over the referendum months to just above 29,000 in the first half of this year, meaning a rise of 16% over the year.

The unaudited figures are understood to show The Herald's average sale has fallen from 37,700 to 34,400 over the year, a fall of 9%.

As in most other news organisations, digital readership has been rising. The heraldscotland.com website has introduced a subscription model which allows four free articles per month before payment is required.

The number of subscriptions has risen by 3,190 to just above 14,000.

Tim Blott, managing director of the Herald and Times Group, said: "Despite general industry trends, our paying readership is growing at a substantial pace. This reflects the quality and scope of our journalism, as well as the uniqueness and integrity of our content."

The Herald and Times Group has recruited Gordon Stevenson as head of digital publishing at the Herald and Times. He spent 21 years at Media Scotland, publisher of the Daily Record and Sunday Mail. A head of social media is also being recruited.

The company recently bought the Romanes Media Group of local newspapers, which was previously family-run and included the Dunfermline Press, Greenock Telegraph and East Lothian Courier.

It is part of the Newsquest UK chain of publishers, which is a subsidiary of the Gannett corporation, based in the USA.

* The figures in this article have been changed from those published on 14 July, after the Herald & Times management agreed to release the unaudited sales figures for their two main titles. The audited figures for January to June will be published in August.