London’s Evening Standard

[Ivor]

Evening Standard to drop daily edition in favour of weekly newspaper

The publication said it has been making ‘substantial losses’ with its current operation, which has prompted the need for a change of direction.

www.standard.co.uk

London’s Evening Standard newspaper is set to scrap its daily editions in favour of a weekly publication.

The newspaper is currently circulated free of charge at the capital’s Underground stations from Monday to Friday.

But in a memo sent to staff and seen by the PA news agency, the company said it has been making “substantial losses” with its current operation, which has prompted the need for a change of direction.

But in a memo sent to staff and seen by the PA news agency, the company said it has been making “substantial losses” with its current operation, which has prompted the need for a change of direction...

It seems that the Evening Standard will cease the free daily weekday publication at many London Stations & certain Underground Stations & just print a weekly edition.

Drop in advertising revenue would point to the main issue, Internet news & commuter footfall has declined. The Metro of a morning a year ago plus cut back to only distributing at bigger stations & even ceasing the freebie on buses across England & Wales, not sure if it was distributed in Scotland or Ireland.

I remember back in the day after London Saturday football fixtures within about an hour to hour & a half of the final whistle joining a crowd outside underground stations for delivery of the classified edition to find out the results/scorers of the old First Division & match reports, had to pay then, thinking about it that was in the 60s/early 70s.

Times have changed re paper print even books with the like of kindle, podcasts etc, progress I suppose.

Wow, it’s come home to me how old I am I do wonder how many of us oldies here still enjoy a newspaper? Some younger generation may also like paper print, not sure if it will be many though.

 

[Andyh82]

The amount of people you see picking them up in London, I would have thought it still did well

I wonder what day of the week the weekly edition will be published as due to people working from home, the best day might be Tuesday, Wednesday or Thursday, which would be a bit strange

 

[Ivor]

The amount of people you see picking them up in London, I would have thought it still did well

I wonder what day of the week the weekly edition will be published as due to people working from home, the best day might be Tuesday, Wednesday or Thursday, which would be a bit strange

Yes I notice the walk by uptake seems high.

I wondered if they’ll publish on a Monday with news/sport from the weekend incorporating current affairs?

 

[Mag_seven]

It used to be quite a good newspaper when you had to pay for it. When it went free it went downhill with only a few pages and those were full of advertising.

 

[3141]

ITV.com reporting “London Evening Standard to drop daily edition in favour of weekly newspaper”

land.

I remember back in the day after London Saturday football fixtures within about an hour to hour & a half of the final whistle joining a crowd outside underground stations for delivery of the classified edition to find out the results/scorers of the old First Division & match reports, had to pay then, thinking about it that was in the 60s/early 70s.

Times have changed re paper print even books with the like of kindle, podcasts etc, progress I suppose.

Wow it’s come home to me how old I am I do wonder how many of us oldies here still enjoy a newspaper? Some younger generation may also like paper print, not sure it will be many though.

There used to be three London evening newspapers. I remember coming out of Southgate station where there was a man selling all of them, calling out "Star, News and Standard". You'd regularly see a van from one or other of these papers arrive, and the driver would throw out a bundle of the latest edition and then roar away to the next drop-off point.

Well, times have changed. For one thing, traffic volumes mean that the vans would be held up and the latest edition might not reach some outlets. Those were the days when the BBC's 6 o'clock radio news bulletin was timed so as not to take sales away from the evening papers. Radio and newspapers (and TV for the very few who could afford it) were the only way of getting the news.

Manchester in the late 1950s had two evening papers: the Manchester Evening News and the Evening Chronicle.

Yes, I'm getting old too. I do enjoy a newspaper but I no longer regularly buy one.

 

[Mcr Warrior]

Manchester in the late 1950s had two evening papers: the Manchester Evening News and the Evening Chronicle.

Still has the "Manchester Evening News". Printed overnight and on the news stands in the morning mind you, and a pale shadow of how it once was, in its heyday.

 

[Magdalia]

What has hit print newspapers the most has been migration of advertising to the internet.

When I first worked in London most copies of the Evening Standard and Evening News were sold by street corner vendors, many at railway stations or on the main walking routes towards them. In those days the street corner vendors were also the only place to buy Private Eye.

There were lots of different editions. "City Prices" had the closing stock market prices, I think the London Stock Exchange closed at 3pm in those days. "Night Final" was the last edition, in the summer this had the tea time cricket scores. Sometimes, news breaking during the day meant that the front page could change completely, hence the phrase "hold the front page".

 

[Kite159]

I'm going to predict in the next couple of years the Evening Standard won't be the only newspaper to drop in frequency of being published. Some of the local 'news' papers are probably a prime case of dropping to being every 2 weeks (so readers can read about how Bert's wheelie bin was stolen and Ada's cat has gone missing).

Give it a couple of years and I suspect the Evening Standard will go online only, with a website full of adverts that it is barely readable on a mobile.

 

[Busaholic]

I'm going to predict in the next couple of years the Evening Standard won't be the only newspaper to drop in frequency of being published. Some of the local 'news' papers are probably a prime case of dropping to being every 2 weeks (so readers can read about how Bert's wheelie bin was stolen and Ada's cat has gone missing).

Give it a couple of years and I suspect the Evening Standard will go online only, with a website full of adverts that it is barely readable on a mobile.

Funny how everything George Osborne touches loses its lustre straightaway, but his services are still apparently valued in the higher reaches of capitalism. Not that everything isn't entirely above board and transparent, needless to say, m'lud, he's just happened to bump into so many Russian lottery jackpot winners in the course of his everyday life.

 

[Thirteen]

Smart Phones have got powerful enough that a daily newspaper in the morning on your commute has become redundant plus transport networks have upgraded to Wi-Fi and 4G/5G.

 

[nlogax]

Feel sad about its demise but this was inevitable. Teenage me would grab copies left behind on evening commuter services arriving from Waterloo purely to remind myself there was life outside of the sticks.

I still occasionally pick one up to scan through on tube journeys but in recent years it's resembled a pamphlet more than than a newspaper, and most stories inside are more an eight hour old snapshot of events that have moved on and reported online.

 

[zero]

I do like having a physical newspaper but I only ever read these when someone else has picked them up and left them on a train/bus(/tram) seat.

If no newspaper is within reach when I board public transport I do use my phone, but I would not go to the metro/ES websites. Thus if these newspapers went online only, I wouldn't read them unless someone sent me a link and gave me a good reason why I should bother clicking it.

 

[londonbridge]

Evening Standard to drop daily edition in favour of weekly newspaper

The publication said it has been making ‘substantial losses’ with its current operation, which has prompted the need for a change of direction.

www.standard.co.uk

I remember back in the day after London Saturday football fixtures within about an hour to hour & a half of the final whistle joining a crowd outside underground stations for delivery of the classified edition to find out the results/scorers of the old First Division & match reports, had to pay then, thinking about it that was in the 60s/early 70s.

Yes, I remember a chap who used to park a van on the corner of the main road and a side street about half a mile from where I lived and sell copies from there, by 5:45 every Saturday there’d be a sizeable crowd building up waiting for copies to arrive, this was mid seventies.

These days I will usually pick up the free copy if I’m going into central London for the evening for a concert,etc, but I don’t go out of my way to get one otherwise.

 

[renegademaster]

Haven't read the evening standard in a long time, but occasionally read the metro , its declined to almost The Sun , level of quality arguably worse

 

[Taunton]

Here we all are cheerfully on the Internet, lamenting the fact that things are changing because people are using that confounded Internet ...

One difference will be a notable reduction in rubbish quantity when Tube trains are swept out at the end of the day.

 

[Ivor]

Here we all are cheerfully on the Internet, lamenting the fact that things are changing because people are using that confounded Internet ...

One difference will be a notable reduction in rubbish quantity when Tube trains are swept out at the end of the day.

Yeah but we can have a good old moan on the ‘net’

A few years ago they put large newspaper bins outside stations & main roads to dispose of used copies but they didn’t seem to be about for long.

 

[deltic]

Evening Standard to drop daily edition in favour of weekly newspaper

The publication said it has been making ‘substantial losses’ with its current operation, which has prompted the need for a change of direction.

www.standard.co.uk

I remember back in the day after London Saturday football fixtures within about an hour to hour & a half of the final whistle joining a crowd outside underground stations for delivery of the classified edition to find out the results/scorers of the old First Division & match reports, had to pay then, thinking about it that was in the 60s/early 70s.

Saturday's edition of the Evening Standard ended in 1974. Sunday's newspapers used to be on sale in many places in central London from around 7pm. Havent seen that happening for many years.

 

[Taunton]

One of the reasons the Sunday papers appeared in sections is, apart from the news, they used to be printed and collated on the presses in mornings during the week.

 

[Trackman]

Still has the "Manchester Evening News". Printed overnight and on the news stands in the morning mind you, and a pale shadow of how it once was, in its heyday.

When I worked in Manchester they had a freebie MEN on a Tuesday (I think) is that still a thing?

 

[Mcr Warrior]

When I worked in Manchester they had a freebie MEN on a Tuesday (I think) is that still a thing?

Not 100% sure, used to be a freebie if picked up in the City Centre on Thursdays/Fridays but otherwise had to be paid for on all other days and in outlying areas.

 

[Richardr]

Are there any real evening newspapers left anywhere in the country? As above, the MEN comes out in the morning, as do one or two other former evening papers.

 

[bleeder4]

I still read physical newspapers. It's much easier to turn the pages and have a quick scan of the stories than it is on your smartphone. Also easier to quickly jump ahead, then back, then forward again, which is just too much of a faff on a smartphone. The joy of newspapers for me is that, every now and then, you will turn a page and come across a random story that is genuinely interesting to you. If you only got your news from, say, the BBC website or from Social Media, you would probably never have come across that story as you'll just be clicking through the main news categories that normally interest you, or seeing news stories served up to you by the algorithm. So you would miss those quirky random stories that actually end up quite interesting you.

 

[LowLevel]

Here we all are cheerfully on the Internet, lamenting the fact that things are changing because people are using that confounded Internet ...

One difference will be a notable reduction in rubbish quantity when Tube trains are swept out at the end of the day.

Funnily enough when I started on the railway one of the unofficial "jobs" of the platform staff at my station was to go through the morning trains from Birmingham and collect up all the newspapers for distribution to the various mess rooms.

Nowadays it is rare to see anything but a Metro and even they are far fewer in number than even 5 years ago when you had to collect the damn things in armfuls to get rid of them.

 

[Western Lord]

I enjoy spending time browsing newspaper archives. If I want to find out what was on at the Odeon Leicester Square this week fifty years ago, I can look it up on the Evening Standard archive. In fifty years time it will be impossible for someone to find out what was on at the Odeon Leicester Square this week. I grant you that few people will want this particular piece of information, but newspaper archives are a valuable general research tool which will not be available to future generations.

 

[WesternLancer]

I enjoy spending time browsing newspaper archives. If I want to find out what was on at the Odeon Leicester Square this week fifty years ago, I can look it up on the Evening Standard archive. In fifty years time it will be impossible for someone to find out what was on at the Odeon Leicester Square this week. I grant you that few people will want this particular piece of information, but newspaper archives are a valuable general research tool which will not be available to future generations.

Extremely good point.

 

[The Ham]

I still read physical newspapers. It's much easier to turn the pages and have a quick scan of the stories than it is on your smartphone. Also easier to quickly jump ahead, then back, then forward again, which is just too much of a faff on a smartphone. The joy of newspapers for me is that, every now and then, you will turn a page and come across a random story that is genuinely interesting to you. If you only got your news from, say, the BBC website or from Social Media, you would probably never have come across that story as you'll just be clicking through the main news categories that normally interest you, or seeing news stories served up to you by the algorithm. So you would miss those quirky random stories that actually end up quite interesting you.

My phone will give me news stories based on stuff I've read previously from a wide range of sources, as such it's possible to still stumble across things that interest me.

Likewise TikTok gives me a lot of content which can be quite diverse, but still of interest.

 

[Taunton]

There were lots of different editions. "City Prices" had the closing stock market prices, I think the London Stock Exchange closed at 3pm in those days. "Night Final" was the last edition, in the summer this had the tea time cricket scores. Sometimes, news breaking during the day meant that the front page could change completely, hence the phrase "hold the front page".

My father was a child in Buxton in 1921 when, shortly after midnight, an LNWR 0-8-0 had a boiler explosion, which was audible across the whole town, waking everyone up - report here:

http://www.railwaysarchive.co.uk/documents/MoT_Buxton1921.pdf

In those, even pre-radio, times the local newspaper was the principal way of disseminating information. The editor leapt up, went to enquire what had happened, and then went to the newspaper office and, wholly without his regular printer and through the night, wrote his copy, set it all up in the press, and rolled them, somehow managing to get this single sheet, 4 page "Explosion Extra" into the morning papers distribution chain.

Unfortunately his skills as a typesetter, and proof-reader, were not perfect (old technology, it was all set up back to front), and a major sub-heading came out as "Two Men Burst When A Boiler Killed". You can imagine how fascinated the town's schoolboys were with such a blunder. He remembered the phrase, and occasionally came out with it, for the rest of his life.

 

[Ashley Hill]

I always felt the quality of the ES went downhill rapidly when it became free. It was always the paper to have for most commuters who would be sat in the train behind it to their home station. It was popular with railwaymen too with staff all down the line jumping on board to find a discarded ES to read. With its four(?) daily editions ,the West End Final being the last, its content was generally serious, factual and well reported. Its supplements were good too.
In its current form it has become just like a larger version of the Metro with celebrity news, gossip, sport and loads of adverts.

 

[Jimini]

Anyone remember the brief war between DMG (London Lite) and Rupert Murdoch (thelondonpaper), shortly before the Standard went free? You had >1m copies of the Metro kicking about in town from the morning, and then ~800k of each of the two evening freebies landed mid to late afternoon. You could barely see any seats on the tube because of the crazy amount of discarded newspapers everywhere!

 

[Taunton]

Cover price was always a minority contribution to newspaper revenue, and was almost wholly consumed by the distribution chain. The actual writing and production was paid for by advertising. Hence the fall-off in this (it has transferred to the Internet, all those ads you have just seen on your way here) has led to the current position.

A newsagent shop owner told me long ago that although he got some income from paper sales, justifying the front counter space taken up, the main advantage was bringing people into the shop to buy other higher margin items as well, in particular cigarettes. That's another part of early morning sales which has shrunk.