NME circulation does what NME circulation does

Down again, down again: print sales have now gone below 14,000 with 13995 copies finding their way into people's hands in the second half of last year.

Topping up with digital sales brings the number up to 15,384 a week, but even digital sales aren't offering much joy: 8.5% of digital readers in the first half of 2014 had vanished by the second half. Digital was never going to take the circulation back to six figures; it's starting to look like it might not keep it above five figures.

All together, NME is down another 23% on the same period in 2013.

Q is now selling 50,161; Mojo 70,693. Kerrang - once the nip-and-tuck rival to NME lost 13.7% of circulation but remains outstripping NME by nearly two-to-one.

And the gloomiest view of the figures? MediaGuardian reminds us:

But [NME] now has just half the sales of its now defunct sister title, Melody Maker, when it was closed in 2000.

Circulation figures for NME stuck on repeat

As I type this, Today on Radio 4 are effectively using the latest NME sales figures as a chance to have run a eulogy.

And the figures are grim - down below 20,000 for the first time; it's a point where received wisdom in publishing suggest there's no hope for a title.

I suspect this won't come as a surprise to the title - the last few weeks had seen a return to the front page of John Lennon, and nothing says panic like slapping The Beatles on the cover.

It's a pity, though, as particularly since the last relaunch the magazine has been better than its been for years - intelligent features, often about surprising subjects, sparky writing. There's still a tendency to do long, pointless lists (how do determine with single X is the 435th or 436th best single ever?) and the covers don't always reflect how much thought is going into the magazine these days.

And maybe that's the trouble - there's a treble problem; having spent so long doing little more than applaud every bon mot of the Gallaghers, there's an alienated audience who might be impossible to win back; the new readers who might have replaced the natural wastage a music title experiences as fans move on need persuading to buy a print publication at all; and the Ozzy Osbourne splashes aren't really helping convince browsers that this is still a magazine that has its ear near the beating heart of music.

With the parent company going through a painful period of restructuring, and such a long history of decline to turn around, the brittle truth is that it might now be too late for simply being better to salvage a print edition.

Rolling Stone: shelf hog

Really interesting post on David Hepworth's blog where he points out that the "terrorist" Rolling Stone issue doubled newsstand sales. To 13,000:

The really interesting thing was this was twice as many as usual, which means that the average issue of Rolling Stone, no matter what superstar, nymphet or American icon is on its cover, no matter how fabulous the cover concept, no matter how expensive the photographer, actually manages to motivate just six and a half thousand Americans to go to the news stand.

Now, it's America, where magazines are sold more through subscription than on the shelves, but that figure of 6,500 is fascinating.

There isn't a supermarket book corner, 7-11 rack or Barnes & Noble display which doesn't carry a couple of issues of each edition Rolling Stone. Even if you cautiously estimate that as 50,000 outlets across the US, with two issues each... that's a hell of a lot of magazines being printed simply to be pulped.

NME circulation continues in the same direction

There's not much to celebrate in the just-published ABC figures for the NME. But then there seldom is.

The headline? Average sales are down now to 20,011 - and around a quarter (5,002) of those are at below full cover price.

That's 13% down compared with the six months to the end of 2012; 16% down on the sale compared with the same period last year.

Is there much comfort for the title in the stats for its digital edition?

Not really, not yet: in the UK, they sold just 356 copies onto people's tablets. The much wider potential market of the rest of the world? 465 copies. Although there's potential there, the NME isn't making any digital headway yet.

There was, however, one glimmer of hope, as one issue managed to out-perform the sluggish sales of the title - the David Bowie cover story. It suggests that when the magazine is able to bring its a-game, it can still create a buzz. Perhaps - given that Liam Gallagher frontpages offer no sales advantage over, say, Haim or Karen O - its time for the magazine to stop clinging to the Gallaghers and start reporting the news?

NME circulation: down, again, but how scary the drop is depends on where you start

First, the good news for the NME in today's circulation figures.

There are still 23,049 copies distributed (Second half of 2012). So that's good.

It's down, but only 3.66% on the sales in the first half of 2012. Which isn't a disaster.

The bad news, though, is compared with the second half of 2011, sales are down a further 16.64%.

So you could see, looking at the last six months, a title whose precipitous drop has eased. Or, across the year as a whole, a magazine whose audience is still vanishing in large numbers.

The next set of figures, in the summer, will be fascinating.

Numbers Mortifying Endlessly

The January - June 2012 circulation figures for NME have been announced today (difficult period, what with the handover of the editor and everything). They're neither surprising nor encouraging, an average circulation of 23,924 per issue.

They were distributing 27,650 issues a week in the second half of last year; in January-June 2011, it was 29,020. That's 17.5% gone in a year.

Rumours suggest that a merger with The Dandy is being considered.

NME: How are those repeated Noel Gallagher covers and list issues working out for you?

More grim news in the latest ABC magazine circulation figures for NME, I'm afraid, as circulation continues to trickle away. They're down to 27,650 copies per issue for the second half of 2011. That's down from 29,020 in the first half of the year and a plunge from 32,166 for the same period in 2010.

On the bright side, the rate of decline is slowing.

Breaking News: NME sale down 16.4%

MediaGuardian is just flashing the latest magazine circulation figures; amongst the headlines is a further chunky drop in the NME figures of 16.4%. Not clear yet if this year-on-year or quarter-on-quarter.

UPDATE: That's year-on-year.

Press Gazette says Q is down to 69,535 and now being outsold by Ben10.

ABCs show NME continuing downwards tumble while K! picks up

Last night was the day all magazine editors dread, when the ABC publishes circulation figures and they discover how many people they've lost from their readership. It's a lot of waving for NME.

Krissi Murison has had a year to remake the magazine in her own image, and one major redesign. So, in sheer number terms, how is she doing?

In the summer 2009 figures, NME was selling 40,948. Now? 33,875.

On a positive note, that's only a 17% year-on-year drop in sales, which is better than the quarter or so vanishing during the later years of Conor McNicholas' reign.

Making things worse for NME, it can't even point to a general malaise. Nearest rival Kerrang is now selling 44,013 - which is up from 43,253 this time last year. Not a massive increase, but an increase nevertheless. It would be turning the knife to point out it's now over 10,000 copies ahead of NME.

Q is selling 89,450 copies monthly, a 10% drop year-on-year - last summer it was selling over 100,000.

Circulation update: The Q is dethroned

Q's surprisingly long reign as biggest-selling paid-for pop magazine has come to an end, with latest ABC circulation figures seeing it drop behind Mojo.

Mojo has managed a tiny uptick in its sales over the last six months, but really claimed its crown by virtue of declining more slowly than its stablemate: Mojo lost 2% (to 98,484) year-on-year, while Q is down 8% (94,811).

Classic Rock - the worthy-but-dull option - is the only title showing an increase over the last twelve months, up 1.5% (71,242).

Over at the weeklies, Kerrang has lost 21.3% of its readers over the last 12 months (41,125), but still manages to be ahead of NME. The NME is down to 38,486, having misplaced just over one-fifth of the readership during the last twelve months.

IPC will be hoping that Krissi Murison can turn things around fairly quickly - surely the title can't afford another year of losing one-out-of-every-five readers?

Folding magazines: Misery all round

So, this is how the Conor McNicholas era at the NME ends - not with a bang, but with a hacking cough and a death rattle.

When Conor took over the magazine in June 2002, circulation stood at 70,456. Today's ABC figures put the number of copies sold at 40,948. To be fair, though, there is still a weekly magazine being put out, and that in itself is something of an achievement.

Elsewhere in the music magazine sector, not only is NME behind Kerrang but - as that title's circulation falls - Kerrang has dropped behind Metal Hammer.

Q is still the most-purchased music title, but having lost 11.5% of its readers over the last twelve months, while Mojo has "only" misplaced 8.1% means that Q's lead over its stablemate is down to just 2,450 copies.

Folding magazines: Vibe cuts back

While the UK music press posts slightly gloomy circulation figures, there's some equally glum news from the US: Vibe is cutting its frequency to 10 issues a year, putting staff on short hours, and cutting its circulation. (In other words, it's going to stop promising advertisers each issue will reach a certain number of issues and pitching for a lower level of take-up; In Vibe's case by 25%.)

In a bid to offset the loss, there's going to be "a twice-a-year newsstand-only celebrity tabloid." Which, unarguably, is trying something new in the face of the current market.

NME abandons slide, goes for tanking

Despite arch rival Kerrang losing nearly a third of its readership year-on-year, the NME still languishes behind the other weekly. The paper lost about a quarter of its readership, dipping below the 50,000 mark to just 48,549 copies a week. Kerrang is just about ahead, managing 52,272.

Actually, NME should worry about Kerrang - it's now being outstripped by Metal Hammer as well. With the NME.com website doing better than ever, unless something spectacular happens for the print edition, the simple force of economic wisdom suggests the NME will become a website that used to have a weekly magazine attached. By the way: leaping onto Skins about two years after it was hip, and just as the series was descending into Carry On Grange Hill clumsiness, isn't "something spectacular" in this context.

Eleswhere, Q is also shedding - just above the 100,000 mark, but 21.6% down on the year. Mojo had a smaller drop (100,507, 5.4% down) similar in size to the drop in Uncut's sales (87,069, 4.3%).

The sales figures for the music sector as a whole are grim reading for anyone who works in music magazines, or, indeed, loves music magazines.

Left on the shelf: Struggling for shelfspace

Latest ABC figures for magazine circulation have been published - and although no music magazine has suffered quite as badly as Maxim, which has lost nearly six out of every ten sales, it's grim news all round.

NME has dropped to just 56,284 in the last six months, down from 64,033 in the six months in the second half of last year and, presumably, weighing up the prospect of a drop below the psychologically important 50,000 level. Arch-rival Kerrang is still outstripping it, but also slipped badly - 76,937 down to 60,290. The NME will probably take a little comfort that Kerrang is dropping two sales for every one lost by the NME; nobody will be very happy at the total market shrinking so rapidly.

Q is still ahead of the pack - down to 113,174, though.

Only Mojo will be ordering a round of harmless fizzy drinks this month - they've seen a slight increase since the last set of six months figures. Only 149 copies, but it's still an increase.

McFly boost the Mail On Sunday

The McFly giveaway has worked some magic for the Mail On Sunday, which sold an extra 300,000 copies on the back of the free record this weekend. Although, oddly, not in London:

"That is probably indicative of people moving over the week with the school holidays," [Mail on Sunday managing director Stephen] Miron said.

Y-e-es. We did hear that last weekend London was virtually empty, save for one woman from Camden who had been asked to feed 798,000 cats and water somewhere over six million pot plants.

Of course, it's debatable if this extra audience are going to return to the Mail - if they didn't just discard the paper in the first place, but Miron is hopeful:

"We have brought in a whole audience that would have never talked about the Mail on Sunday," Miron said.

"I don't think there is a brand out there in the UK at the moment that wouldn't want to be talked about in the way that marks them as different and innovative," Miron said.

Or the sort of newspaper which is so rubbish it's relying on giving away kiddie's albums on its front page to artificially boost its ABC headline figures.

James P, by the way, emailed us to point out the Mail advert promoting the album included a big flashy caption:

"INCLUDING THE NUMBER ONE HIT 'ONE FOR THE RADIO'".

Although, erm, the track only got to number two. As James puts it:

... might be worth remembering next time the Mail runs a story accusing the BBC of fakery and deception after discovering that the experts on 'Dragons' Den' aren't real dragons.

NME response: Let's have another revamp

No, really: MediaGuardian is reporting that having revamped itself again and again, to the sound of disappearing readers, the response to the new drop in circulation is to, yes, have another revamp:

IPC Ignite publishing director Paul Cheal said NME would be revamped later this year.

"NME magazine sits at the heart of the brand and we are constantly sense checking what readers want and looking to evolve the magazine's content and design," Cheal added.

"With this in mind our editorial team are currently engaged in exciting development work which will come to market later this year."

A cynic might wonder, if the paper is so careful about finding out what its readers wants, and then delivering it, why are they vanishing?

MediaGuardian also points out that the NME's circulation has now fallen below that of Classic Rock for the first time.

NME's up... just

Although it's no closer to retaking the 'worlds biggest rock weekly' title from Kerrang, the nme can take a little comfort at another slight nudge upwards in its circulation figures. The return of rock and half-naked pictures of Craig from the Vines has at least stopped the drain of readers, and the paper has now experienced a full year of rising sales.

Meanwhile, Q manages to replace the readers it had to forget about when it was found to have been getting its figures wrong last time round, and Uncut and Mojo are both doing well.

The dance music magazine sector looks to be dead, though. Expect more panic measures from Mixmag and Muzik in the next few months, followed by closure of at least one of them.

NME: Some signs of life

The slump in NME's readership has been stopped, to sighs of relief at King's Reach Tower. Although a small increase - 2.7% year on year - the nudge of ciculation back to 72,000 suggests that maybe the formula of glossy cover, smaller format and briefer articles may have given the fifty year old a future. An upturn in rock bands worth reading about can't have hurt, either.

Kerrang, however, firmed up its position as the World's Best Selling Rock Weekly with just a snip under 84,000 readers (60% up on a year ago.) The other metal/rock titles all posted healthy increases. But it's Q which must now adopt the title 'The sick man of the newstand' - while labelmate Mojo grew its readership, Q has lost one in ten of its readers since last year.

In other segments, the Popbitch regime at the Face (and its ludicrous attempts to seem hip by writing about the trend-before-last as if they were new - guys, scouse girls have been wearing pyjamas as day wear since '99; even the Liverpool Echo has managed to cover that) is facing a huge struggle - another 6% down this quarter; 13% down on the year, and getting dangerously close to the all important 50,000 level. Smash Hits and Top of the Pops are down as well.

NME up, Kerrang up more [MediaGuardian] - TVTimes/NME merger put back to 2003...