Tindle Newspapers this week completed its biggest-ever deal paying £18.75 million for 27 weekly newspapers and nine ‘niche titles’in its southern division.
The papers have a weekly circulation of around one million copies and a turnover of around £20 million.
In a statement, Tindle Newspapers owner Sir Ray Tindle said: ‘Our current figures show that small local newspapers are standing up very well in current conditions.”
The company started by Sir Ray with an army pay-off at the end of World War Two now has 225 titles.
The titles bought by Tindle include the Essex-based Yellow Advertiser series, the South London Press, Streatham Post, Mitcham Post, Bexley Mercury, Barnet Press, Enfield Advertiser and Enfield Gazette.
Sir Ray told Press Gazette: ‘We have been in London before, we were there in the 1960s and 1970s, and we saw this opportunity – they are very good newspapers.”
When asked whether there would be any job cuts, he said: ‘We haven’t got that sort of reputation. We are certainly not sitting here thinking about that.”
The sale is the latest in a succession of sell-offs following Trinity Mirror’s strategic review. It has sold Berkshire Regional Newspapers for £10 million to the Berkshire Media Group, a subsidiary of The Dunfermline Press. A further 25 titles in Trinity Mirror South were sold to Northcliffe Media for £64m.
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