Newspaper Death Watch: Ad Sales Plummet, Says NAA
Newspaper advertising plunged almost 30% in the first quarter of 2009 compared to the same period last year, according to the latest figures published on the Newspaper Association of America’s Web site.
Print ad revenue fell 29.7% during the first quarter of 2009 compared to the same period last year to $5.9 billion, according to the NAA.
At the same time, online ad revenue fell 13.4% during the first three months of this year compared to the first quarter of 2008 to $6.6 million, the NAA reported.
In total, online and offline newspaper advertising dropped 28.3% in the first quarter of this year compared to the first three months of 2008 to $6.6 billion, according to the NAA.
Not surprisingly, the hardest-hit offline ad category was classifieds, which saw a 42.3% plunge in revenue to $1.5 billion in the first quarter of 2009 compared to the same period last year, the NAA reported.
The report comes as newspapers face the toughest struggle in their history.
Media analyst Jack Myers recently predicted newspaper advertising will drop 22.5% in 2009 on top of a 17% drop last year.
NewspaperDeathWatch.com lists 11 metropolitan dailies that have gone belly up since it was launched in March 2007, including the Tucson Citizen, the Baltimore Examiner and the Rocky Mountain News.
