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India’s leading newspapers — including top English dailies — have drastically curtailed their circulation and pagination since the pandemic, leading to a 25-30% drop in newsprint over the past five years.
What looks like a setback has in fact become a survival strategy, enabling publishers to maintain, and in some cases grow, their advertising revenues.
“Cutting down on copies and pages helped lower production costs, balancing the 10–15% drop in ad rates that advertisers secured post-Covid. In effect, fewer copies on the ground translated into healthier margins on existing ad volumes. That's the reason ad revenues for most of the players are almost at par with, or higher than, 2020 levels even as circulation has shrunk,” newspaper executives told e4m, on condition of anonymity.
For advertisers, however, the picture is less reassuring. Most spend about 10–15% of their ad budgets on print, but with real circulation figures opaque — and the Indian Readership Survey (IRS) on hold — many are unaware of the true reach of their campaigns.
Observers caution that while this strategy has worked as a short-term buffer, it may not be sustainable. “For now, publishers have bought themselves time, but the question remains: how long can print ride on thinner paper? Prolonged under-reporting of circulation and shrinking readership could eventually erode advertiser confidence, especially if digital platforms continue to deliver sharper metrics and accountability,” said an executive.
Notably, the IRS, long regarded as the only credible currency for India’s print media industry, has remained stalled for five years. First COVID-19 and then funding disputes were cited as reasons, however, industry insiders believe the real hurdle is publishers’ reluctance to face declining circulation numbers.
“Even as pagination and copies have been slashed, a significant share of copies never reaches readers, with publishers offloading them as scrap while still projecting inflated circulation figures. A fresh survey could expose these uncomfortable truths and weaken their advertising pitch,” a newspaper editor admitted.
Pilot test after prolonged delay?
e4m on Monday reported that the publishers demand that the IRS should first undergo a pilot test to assess whether physical surveys are still feasible in the post-pandemic era, particularly in metro cities.
The Media Research Users Council of India (MRUCI) in its board meetings discussed the matter at length, though it is yet to finalise the pilot’s scope, sample size, and locations, as members are increasingly concerned over the traditional door-to-door survey model.
“Housing societies have become restrictive making surveyor access increasingly difficult. Besides, families value privacy more now. In cities like Mumbai and Delhi, both men and women are working and out of home from morning till late night, and even if you manage to reach them, they may not be willing to spare 45 minutes for a survey,” MRUCI members told e4m.
This matter has raised fresh concerns within MRUCI over whether the cost and complexity of resuming IRS — likely to exceed the ?20 crore spent in 2019 — can be justified at a time when the survey’s utility is under debate in a digital-first market.
Ironically, the booming e-commerce and quick-commerce sectors — whose delivery staff navigate the same gates daily — suggest the hurdle may be more perceived than real.
Nevertheless, whether the survey — the only currency for India’s print industry — returns at all will depend on the willingness of publishers.
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