Quality newspapers ‘not profitable’, Guardian boss claims

GNM managing director Tim Brooks

Business models for the UK’s leading newspapers “do not make any sense”, according to the managing director of Guardian News & Media (GNM).

Speaking in this week’s PrintWeek magazine, which comes out on Friday, Tim Brooks claimed that due to declining circulations and the advent of online news, the quality press is being forced to re-evaluate its operations to make them sustainable.

The interview, by PrintWeek’s Tom Hall, follows Brooks’ recent comment to fellow Haymarket title Media Week that he would never launch another print product.

“The real issue is that the quality press, in aggregate, is not profitable,” he told PrintWeek.

He went on to say: “The days when you can trade in just words are gone.”

GNM, which is part of the Guardian Media Group and operates the Guardian, the Observer and guardian.co.uk, has not made a profit since 2000 and is supported financially by the Scott Trust.

Brooks has said he will never launch another printed newspaper and has pitched the company’s future on multimedia and guardian.co.uk, which currently attracts 26 million unique users per month – the highest of all the UK newspapers, according to ABCe figures from the end of 2008.

“All future investments will be digital,” he said.

For more, see this week’s PrintWeek.

Source: printweek.com