Newspapers with close readership
Swiss newspapers have seen a slight overall decline in readership in recent months. It is primarily the major publications that are losing readers, while traditional regional newspapers are maintaining stable readership figures.
20 Minuten remains the most widely read newspaper in Switzerland, according to the latest figures published on Tuesday by the AG für Werbemittelforschung (Wemf). In German-speaking Switzerland, the reach of the commuter newspaper fell by 7.1 percent to 1.36 million readers within a year.
The print edition of Blick had a significantly lower readership. The number of readers shrank by 18 percent to 526,000. Blick am Abend fared better with a drop of 6.9 percent to 623,000 readers.
In contrast, the readership of the Tages-Anzeiger remained unchanged at 460,000. The NZZ suffered a decline of 8.0 percent to 248,000 readers. Regional newspapers such as AZ Nordwestschweiz, Berner Zeitung, Der Bund, Thurgauer Zeitung and Zürcher Regionalzeitungen, on the other hand, were able to maintain their readership.
The Basler Zeitung had significantly fewer readers (-16 percent). Among the newspapers published on Sundays, the SonntagsZeitung had a practically unchanged readership of 624,000. For the first time, it outstripped SonntagsBlick, whose readership fell sharply by 14.6 percent to 586,000. NZZ am Sonntag just managed to hold its own with 399,000 readers (-4.3 percent).
Basler Zeitung refers to multi-year comparison
In a press release, Basler Zeitung points out that it is not one of the big losers, but that Blick and the Sunday newspaper genre have been the real losers since 2013. In a six-month comparison, the confidence range ensures that titles remain statistically in the confidence range. In the more meaningful three-year comparison, which was possible for the first time in 2016 since the change in survey methodology in 2013, Basler Zeitung lost print readers to a similar extent as all other regional, paid daily newspapers.
The press release quotes Wemf Head of Research Harald Amschler, who supports BaZ's approach: "We very much support the approach chosen by Basler Zeitung to compare reach over several years (MACH Basic 2013-2 to 2016-2). After all, it is only possible to determine reliable developments on the basis of a multi-year comparison." (hae/SDA)
