Sun-Times Circulation Scandal Revealed
By Margaret Lyons in News on Oct 6, 2004 3:52PM
The Hollinger scandal has finally busted itself wide upen, but the ensuing legal battles have probably just begun. Hollinger International, which owns the Sun-Times, has admitted, after a three-month investigation, that they inflated the Sun-Times' circulation by over 50,000 for weekdays and 17,000 on Sundays. According to Hollinger's press release, Saturday circulation was not inflated. Weird.
Hollinger's investigation also revealed that circulation numbers were inaccurate for the the Daily Southtown and the Star (both Chicagoland papers, and the Jerusalem Post (Israel-land).
Inflation of The Chicago Sun-Times single-copy circulation began modestly and increased over time. The average inflation that occurred in the twelve-month period ending March 1997…was 2,814 copies per day during the week, and 672 copies on Sundays. In the most recent report of The Chicago Sun-Times circulation published…the average single-copy inflation had grown to 50,191 weekday copies and 17,318 Sunday copies.
The Sun-Times's actual circulation is approximately 430,000 for weekdays; the Tribune's is 615,000. Things have been pretty shitty over at the Sun-Times for a while now, and this isn't helping. In addition to all the corporate scandal hoohah, the Sun-Times is still for sale, and unionized Sun-Times reporters are in the middle of contract negotiations. "Both sides remain far apart on a new contract," according to the Trib. So, anyone want a disgraced, second-place newspaper with a union struggle on its hands? Cause that shit is Priced To Move.
Hollinger has set aside $27 million to pay back advertisers who were misled by the fake numbers; already, 11 class action law suits are pending against the paper. Yeah, $27 million sounds like a lot, but the Tribune Company just set aside $95 million to compensate advertisers after their own circulation scandal at Newsday and Hoy.
But how do you pull off a 50,000-paper scam? In three easy steps, that's how. Listen up, aspiring newspaper owners, and you too can have a delicious scandal on your inky hands:
1. "Shift returns." Newspapers have to report how many issues get returned every day. Lie about what day those papers came back—pick a day that you're not required to report on, or a day advertisers don't care about.
2. Pay people not to return unsold papers. It might actually be cheaper than having to lie about when they were returned.
3. This one's our favorite. Newspapers get money to recycle their unsold/old issues. Deposit that money into a charitable trust that buys newspapers for schools, making sure that they buy your newspaper. Did you catch that? You're buying your own paper.
There you go! You're on your way corporate decrepitude, young one.