Local papers see surge in popularity

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Swiss regional newspapers are benefitting from a resurgence in readership, while the larger daily papers are still suffering from dwindling circulation. The most-read paper in Switzerland is the freesheet 20 Minuten.

A survey by the market research institute WEMF asked about readership between October 2013 and September 2014, conducting around 19,000 interviews.

Both the largest commuter-targeted freesheet, 20 Minuten, and the second-largest, Blick am Abend, lost readers. 20 Minuten had a reach of 1,507,000, down 33,000 from a year before. Blick am Abend had a reach of 696,000, down 40,000 from the previous year.

The dailies Tages-Anzeiger and Blick suffered the same problem, though to a lesser extent. The Neue Zürcher Zeitung in contrast increased its readership, if only by 8,000 to 263,000.

Regional success

The survey revealed a growth in popularity among readers for Switzerland’s regional papers: the Aargauer Zeitung, the Neue Luzerner Zeitung, Winterthur’s Landbote and the two papers serving the capital, Berner Zeitung and Der Bund. The St. Galler Tagblatt’s reach stayed almost the same. Some regional papers did not have comparable figures.

Much smaller papers such as the Freiburger Nachrichten also scored well, compared with the previous year.

The SonntagsBlick was clearly the most-read weekend paper. The NZZ am Sonntag, the SonntagsZeitung and the Schweiz am Sonntag all made gains.

In French-speaking Switzerland, the largest papers fared somewhat better than in the German-speaking part of the country. 20 minutes remained the region’s most-read paper, despite losing 5,000 readers. Its readership now stands at 535,000.

It was followed by Le Matin Dimanche (up 10,000 to 474,000) and Le Matin (up 17,000 to 310,000).

Of the regional dailies, the biggest surprise was Le Nouvelliste in canton Valais, which attracted an additional 8,000 readers, giving it its highest ever readership of 124,000. This put it in second place behind 24heures in canton Vaud (no change at 183,000) but ahead of Tribune de Genève (up 5,000 to 119,000).

In Italian-speaking Switzerland, increases were recorded among the readership of 20 minuti (89,000 to 93,000), La Regione Ticino (93,000 to 100,000) and Caffé della domenica (87,000 to 95,000). However, the Corriere del Ticino saw its readership drop by 3,000 to 132,000.