Update: The Age and AFR get stay of execution from Nine in Tasmania
It appears Nine is set to continue printing its Australian Financial Review and The Age titles in Tasmania, despite a price hike from its local printing press, Australian Community Media.
Managing director of Nine Publishing, James Chessell said: “There has been positive movement on the printing of The Age and The Australian Financial Review in Tasmania, and we are happy to confirm that the printed issues of those mastheads will continue. We are always exploring ways with our printing partners to ensure the physical paper is available as broadly as possible.”
Previously, it was reported Nine was set to stop printing its Australian Financial Review and The Age titles in Tasmania, in response to a price hike from its local printing press, Australian Community Media.
Chessell told Mumbrella at the time: “It’s not a decision we have taken lightly but the rising cost of paper means it is uneconomic to print in Tasmania. We will continue to focus on our many Tasmanian digital subscribers who are able to access the increasingly-popular digital version of ‘today’s paper’.”
Nine pulls out of print in Tasmania
ACM was contacted for comment.
Nine was expected to be withdrawing entirely from print in Tasmania as higher paper prices in Australia had caused a “substantial price rise” by ACM, Mumbrella understood.
Circulation figures for both titles in Tasmania are unknown, and not made publicly available by Nine, though it is understood that the number of print subscribers is low.
CEO of Nine, Mike Sneesby told Mumbrella in August that print remains part of the “long-term plan” for the business, despite declining circulation and a long-term decline of print newspapers.
“Nowhere in our long-term plans do we foresee a world where the printing of newspapers doesn’t exist. So we continue to focus on a strategy that has both print publications, as well as digital publications.”
Chessell at Mumbrella Publish Conference
Last month at its Upfront, Nine introduced its downloadable digital pdf versions of both The Age, Sydney Morning Herald, and AFR, which Nine will be hoping its uptake replaces the soon-to-be-extinct hard copies.
Nine’s end-of-year financial results this year showed print subscription drop 6%, with retail revenue also dipping 6%, despite print advertising revenue trending upwards 13%.
Nine’s publishing division has made a heavy push on its digital subscription transformation, which Chessell spoke about at this year’s Mumbrella Publish Conference, with digital subscriptions and licensing seeing a 66% revenue uptick over the last financial year.
Australia is now down to just one paper mill, the Boyer Mill which is located in Tasmania, which produces newsprint.
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Calum Jaspan was news editor at Mumbrella, based in Melbourne. He was also the producer and host of the Mumbrellacast. He left Mumbrella in May 2023.
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