• The Irish Times begins to spread its wings

    There seems to have been a conscious effort by The Irish Times trust and board of management in recent years to diverge its business interests past the infamous broadsheet that is known up and down the country.

    The newspaper probably has one of the best online incarnations in Ireland which not only includes each days newspaper but also has searchable archives which are quite user friendly, breaking news sections and a collection of their special features (such as their special on Haughey at his death). All of this is sadly hindered by the fact that the website is subscription based however once the issue of money is overcome the site is extremely well built.

    The newspaper also owns and runs nicemove.ie since 2004, one of many property/job etc. websites in Ireland. They’re not the only newspaper to have such a site; Independent News & Media PLC also has Loadza, a possibly lesser known all-in-one site and recruitireland.com is part of the TCH group.
    In recent months, however, the group has made its mark in more traditional media; newspaper and radio. When Associated Newspapers brought the Metro newspaper to Dublin, The Irish Times agreed to print the publication and in doing so took 45% of the companies shares. This was a shrewd move by the group as a publication like the Metro would have little to no effect on its core business, namely The Irish Times. If anything the Metro would prove to be a thorn in the side of that other big Irish daily, The Irish Independent.

    In today’s Irish Times Emmet Oliver notes the applications made to the BCI for a new youth service in the North West of the country (subs req). One consortium, listed on the BCI website as Red FM North West, includes The Irish Times as a minority (5%) shareholder; interestingly Thomas Crosbie Holdings is also there with 8%. While the percentage is quite small, radio is an interesting venture for a company known for its daily broadsheet and little else.

    As it stands there is little room for movement in the newspaper market in Ireland; The Irish Times is still considered the higher quality daily newspaper and interestingly few seem to want to challenge that. The Irish Independent, (Irish) Daily Mail and to some extend Evening Herald are all pitched in a battle amongst themselves as are the (Irish) Sun, (Irish) Mirror and The Star. The only competition The IT has is from the likes of The Guardian who do give coverage to Irish news but is by no means an Irish edition.

    As far as newspapers go, with their shares in Metro, The Irish Times would not move into the tabloid market with a second publication; although it’s unlikely that it ever would have anyway. Notably it is the only publication left on the Irish market that still prints exclusively in the broadsheet format (if you exclude Sunday’s offerings) and has shown resistance to changing its own format even if it didn’t impact on its content.

    The only other place The Irish Times trust could go is, of course, Sunday and interestingly when The Tribune went bust after Vincent Browne’s ill-fated attempt to launch a sister paper (The Dublin Tribune) it was rumoured that they were going to pick up the pieces however Independent News & Media swooped in, probably as a precautionary measure.
    Today however things are quite different than they were in the late 80’s and early 90’s; The Sunday market is as saturated as the daily one with The Sunday Tribune, Sunday Business Post, (Ireland) on Sunday, Sunday Independent and then The News of The World, The Star on Sunday, Sunday World etc. etc.

    Couple that with the fact that the Sunday market is a very different one the dailies and the very public financial trouble The IT has had in recent times and it is unlikely that the trust would attempt such a high risk strategy.

    If anything their business ventures recently have been conservative; in both instances they’ve gotten in at the ground up and in one case take a tiny piece of the pie. If they do pay off however, should Metro Ireland becomes profitable and Red FM North West wins the licence and makes some money we are sure to see some increased moves and purchases from the publication. Who knows? Maybe there will be an Irish Sunday Times in a few years although it’s unlikely at this point; there is no single Sunday newspaper that holds the prestige of The Irish Times but that doesn’t mean that the audience is crying out for an alternative just yet. Besides this any new venture in the Irish newspaper market is quickly pressed on by the competition, usually before it even arrives; note the launch of Herald AM in responce to the Metro last year and the shift in direct at The Irish Independent when it was clear that The (Irish) Daily Mail was on its way too.

    I have no doubt that The Irish Times could provide a good Sunday newspaper but it would take a lot of study and research and it couldn’t simply be an extension of the daily publication; even with all the right content and marketing there’s still no certainty that it would be a hit either.

    Update: A somewhat unexpected move in today’s Irish Times (subs etc.), although not exactly a completely shocking one;

    The Irish Times has made an investment in a new women’s magazine publishing group, Gloss Publications, which has been set up by the former managing director of Image Publications, Jane McDonnell.

    The company is planning to publish a new title, Gloss, within a few months, aimed at the top end of the women’s magazine market.

    The monthly magazine is expected to sell for €4 and to have an initial print run of 30,000 – 35,000 copies.

    I’ve always considered the womens magazine market to be very over-crowded; although perhaps more on the lower end than higher… things seems to be moving fast for The IT, perhaps it is all that capital from the D’Olier Street sale.