Gazeta Wyborcza goes local; Axel Springer to unveil monthly business magazine
Agora, publisher of the Gazeta Wyborcza daily, has launched five district supplements for its Saturday section, Gazeta Stoleczna.
Until now, Agora had been running two sub-local monthly supplements covering Warsaw's Ursynow and Zoliborz districts. According to industry insiders, the new supplements might be Agora's way of competing for additional segments of the Warsaw ad market. "Gazeta Wyborcza's move to increase its number of sub-local supplements in Warsaw might be a sign of pressure from the competition, but on the other hand it might be further expansion," said Rene Frey, managing director of Metropol, a free publication distributed in Warsaw. "Regional markets, the source of small ads, is where (Agora) can really expand now."
Although Gazeta Wyborcza dominates the capital's market with 80% of press ad sales, competition from foreign-backed free publications is heating up. Dzien Dobry, a free weekly published by Marieberg Publications Polska, a subsidiary of Swedish media group Bonnier, has a circulation of 300,000. The paper's goal is to achieve a 10% share of Warsaw's ad market by the end of this year.
Metro International (MI), which distributes 200,000 copies of its Warsaw daily Metropol, is aiming for a 10% ad market share by the end of this year. "In some sectors, such as telecoms or services (ads), we've already gained an 11-12% ad market share (as estimated by Agora Monitoring)," Frey said.
According to Stanislaw Turnau, deputy director general of Agora, the wave of new competition has influenced the company's strategy. "But it wasn't the only reason why we introduced new sub-local supplements," he said, adding that Agora started running its first sub-local publication two years ago. "But the ad market has been slowing down lately, and it's harder to increase our ad sales so we need to get more from the local ad budgets."
Gazeta Wyborcza is counting on the supplements' success among smaller advertisers, such as car dealers and shop owners, which can't afford to place ads in Gazeta Stoleczna. "But they will be able to (advertise) in sub-local supplements, which account for 10-15% of Gazeta Stoleczna's ad volume," Turnau said. "Ad prices in sub-local supplements will be several times lower than those in Gazeta Stoleczna."
Turnau said he is also looking to boost the paper's readership. "We want to provide our readers with a portion of real local information," he said. "Normally, you wouldn't write about smelly trash bins in Wola, for instance, but in these new supplements we will cover really local information."
The new supplements will cover the areas of Praga Polnoc, Praga-Poludnie, Wawer/Rembertow, Wola/Bemowo and Targowek/Bialoleka.
Get the picture: Wieslaw Podkanski, president of Alex Springer Polska, during the opening of Profit.
Axel Springer Polska, the publisher of pop-culture magazines such as Dziewczyna, Na Zywo, Sekrety Serca and Pani Domu, is set to launch a business monthly this week.
Profit, available at newsstands beginning April 18, will have a circulation of 160,000. "It's not that we are doing it because we are not enjoying enough prestige as a publisher I would never put it like that our position on the market is satisfactory," said Wieslaw Podkanski, president of Axel Springer Polska. "We are simply looking for new segments of the (press) market."
According to Podkanski, Profit will be unlike anything available on the market. "It's written in a correct, concise, but relatively simple style," Podkanski said. "Its layout and graphics are dynamic and colorful with lots of possibly shocking leads and captions. Despite being a monthly, it's meant to be up to date and fast." In addition, the magazine will feature investigative reporting. The magazine's Web site (www.eProfit.pl) is also set to launch this week.
Podkanski wouldn't reveal how much Axel had invested in the magazine's kickoff. "As a rule, though, we are generous when launching new projects because it's better to spend more money at the beginning and make a good start," he said.
Axel Springer's other big project, the Polish version of Newsweek, is still in the works. "We have conducted a lot of surveys revealing that people would welcome at least one new weekly on the market (to compete with Wprost and Polityka)," said Podkanski, who refused to say how much Axel Springer paid for the Newsweek license. "But we're ready to spend really big money on this project." So far Axel Springer has hired 50 journalists and, according to Podkanski, the magazine's Polish title has already been chosen. "It doesn't need to be published under the same name (Newsweek). As for the launch date, "(It's) a closely guarded secret because the competition is hot on our heels," said Podkanski, referring to Tele Tydzien-publisher Wydawnictwo H. Bauer, which is busy preparing its own weekly magazine.
TV Puls, the new channel launched last month by the Franciscan order, has introduced a bargain-basement promotional campaign to reel in advertisers.
While the station refused to reveal details of the March 18-April 30 offer, TV Puls is banking on its success.
"Advertisers are interested in (TV Puls' offer) because of the very low prices," said Maciej Krol, a broadcast media manager at media house CIA Poland. "Under the promotion, advertising (time) is practically free." He added that advertisers have been gobbling up air time as they have little to lose.
But as it turns out, TV Puls doesn't have a lot of ad time to sell. Under its broadcasting license, TV Puls has the right to sell only 2% of its broadcasting time to advertisers. And the National Radio and Television Council (KRRiTV) has refused to allow the station to increase its commercial time limit to 15%. "In the three weeks since the KRRiTV (refused the increase), it has not been able to justify (its decision)," said TV Puls spokesman Bartlomiej Pawlak. "Finally, we received the explanation yesterday, so now we are going to appeal it," Pawlak said last Wednesday. He declined to disclose the details of the KRRiTV's decision.
Market insiders said that a sustained level of 2% ad time means TV Puls will not be able to survive.
"TV Puls has a very small limit (for advertising)," Krol said, adding that according to the law, commercial TV stations are allowed to broadcast ads for a maximum 15% of their entire broadcasting schedule.
"Certainly (TV Puls) won't be able to operate in the way that was assumed in our business plan," Pawlak said. "We expected to have 15% from the very beginning."
In addition to little ad time, TV Puls has another problem to contend with: how to boost its current 0.5% audience figure to attract advertisers.
"If audience figures rise to around 2-3%, TV Puls could certainly be profitable," Krol said. Pawlak added that TV Puls had assumed a 3% audience share by the end of the year. The station plans to approach that figure by boosting its national reach from about 40% of the population today to 50% in a few months. But achieving an audience figure of 2-3% is not going to be easy, according to AGB Polska, which reports that TV Puls' 0.5% audience figure for March 18-31 pales in comparison to private channel TV4, launched last year, which had a 3.5% audience figure in the same period, and private broadcaster TVN, which had 14.9%.
