Daily Star Sunday: TV ads boost
The Daily Star Sunday launches this weekend with a nationwide price of 35p and aimed mainly at some of the 300,000 to 400,000 people who never buy a Sunday paper.
The price will give the other redtops – each selling at 65p — a run for their money. The Daily Star, which sells for 10p in the Carlton TV area, is increasing its sales month after month and its latest ABC was up 14 per cent year-on-year to 691,777. In August, the daily sale averaged 753,927.
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Owner Richard Desmond has invested heavily in the Daily Star and more of his cash is going into the new Sunday. Hundreds of thousands of pounds will be spent on a series of TV ads for the paper this week.
Unlike most Sundays, which have a separate identity from their daily sisters, the new paper will be very similar to the Daily Star "because it is a seven-day operation" said Hugh Whittow, editor of the new Sunday. Editor-in-chief is Daily Star editor Peter Hill.
Whittow said: "It’s a tried and tested formula. We know that so many of our readers want a Sunday paper to follow through from the daily because they are dissatisfied with the papers they’ve been buying. There’s a definite market out there. Research shows between 300,000 and 400,000 people don’t buy a Sunday paper and we hope the others will buy us as a seven-day operation."
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The Daily Star Sunday will have a showbiz magazine Star World and a free gift with its launch issue. Writing sports columns will be Sky Sports presenter Helen Chamberlain and former England captain Bryan Robson.
Most of Whittow’s staff will be part-timers. He will have 20 to 30 production journalists at the company’s printworks at Broughton in Lancashire. His in-house London team will be topped up with casuals and journalists from the Daily Star and the design team.
The top team, all with national newspaper experience, includes Dave Harbord as deputy editor and night editor, chief sub-editor Michael Woods, news editor Ian Trueman, picture editor Peter Case, sports editor Ray Ansbro and art director Pippa Geeves.
By Jean Morgan
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