Swindon Advertiser

Last updated

Swindon Advertiser
Swindon-Advertiser-Frontpage.JPG
Swindon Advertiser cover on 20 February 2007
TypeDaily newspaper
Format Tabloid
Owner(s) Newsquest Media Group
Founded1854
Headquarters Dorcan, Swindon
Circulation 4,024(as of 2023) [1]
Website swindonadvertiser.co.uk

The Swindon Advertiser is a daily tabloid newspaper, published in Swindon. The newspaper was founded in 1854, and had an audited average daily circulation at the end of 2017 of 8,828. [2]

Contents

It claims to have been the UK's first provincial 'penny-paper'. [3]

It is owned by Newsquest, the UK subsidiary of U.S.-based Gannett Company.

It is the original of the four newspapers that had their headquarters in the Newsquest Wiltshire building in Victoria Road, Swindon, the others being three weeklies:

History

The Swindon Advertiser was founded in 1854 by William Morris (Great Grandfather of Desmond Morris). Originally intended to be a weekly paper, His aim was to produce a newspaper "that would act as a mouthpiece for the poor." [3] Morris decided to print one issue a month due to the Stamp Tax laws at the time only applying to newspapers published every 28 days.

It was originally printed as a broadsheet on 6 February 1854 and titled the "Swindon Advertiser and Monthly Record" using a hand press in his father's shop in Wood Street. Morris was sole writer, editor, printer and also delivered it personally, selling each copy for a penny. Using the inclusion of advertisements from local businesses, the second edition doubled in size.

Other newspaper companies were influenced by Morris' example of a penny priced paper and quickly produced their own in the region and ultimately throughout the country, resulting in the government amending the stamp tax laws to a more favourable version. The paper became published weekly due to this change. In 1855 Morris could afford to move the publication to new premises in Victoria Road where it has remained. Morris funded the building of Newspaper House and added a printing shop to the rear.

Morris became infamous in some circles for his scathing and often vitriolic editorials, [3] with one editorial about an incident at Coate Water in 1861 leading to effigies of him and copies of his paper being burned in the town. [3]

The whole proceedings were so strongly condemned by the editor and proprietor of the "Swindon Advertiser" that he roused the irony of a section of Conservatives in the town and district to such an extent that men were employed to scour the district and collect all the "Advertisers" they possibly could. This having been done, a bon-fire was made in the Market Square, in which all these copies, also an effigy of the Editor himself, were committed to the flames.

— Frederick Large, [4]

In the same year, the paper was printed using steam power for the first time. Using a boiler and engine built in the Swindon Works of the Great Western Railway, they produced 5,000 copies a week. [5]

In 1870, it was renamed the "Swindon Advertiser and Wiltshire, Berkshire and Gloucestershire Chronicle". [5] William Morris died at the age of 65 in 1891 and the paper passed into the hands of his three sons, William, Samuel and Frank. [3]

Daily publishing began in 1898, with it being renamed the "Evening Advertiser" in 1926. [5]

The company also acquired the "North Wiltshire Herald" in 1922, now titled the "Gazette and Herald". [5]

Due to paper shortages, the paper became a tabloid during the 1940s, [6] switching back to the broadsheet format after the war. With the advances in technology, the paper moved to desktop publishing methods in the 1980s and then on 6 September 1995 changed back to being published as a tabloid. [6]

In July 2005, the paper changed its name back to the "Swindon Advertiser" and announced its intention to publish two editions a day, [7] with this change came a price rise from 32p to 35p. In 2006 the two editions per day were dropped and only one daily edition was printed, the price remained at 35p. The paper went to print at 04.00am each morning and was generally on the shelves by 07.00am, distributed by a fleet of transit vans across Wiltshire.[ citation needed ]

In November 2008 the paper's cover price was increased from 35p to 38p. It currently stands at 65p after being pushed up in price late 2010 to 42p and again in 2013.[ citation needed ]

Due to a petition raised and successfully imposed by Mathew Purvis (a local Swindon resident) the price will remain fixed at 65p for at least until 2016. This was raised on the basis that the key demographic for the paper was populated by those suffering from a dip in the economy, and was designed to create and raise a community morale.

Editors

Photographers

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Tabloid (newspaper format)</span> Type of newspaper

A tabloid is a newspaper with a compact page size smaller than broadsheet. There is no standard size for this newspaper format.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Print circulation</span> Number of printed copies of a publication

Print circulation is the average number of copies of a publication. The number of copies of a non-periodical publication are usually called print run. Circulation is not always the same as copies sold, often called paid circulation, since some issues are distributed without cost to the reader. Readership figures are usually higher than circulation figures because of the assumption that a typical copy is read by more than one person.

<i>Evening Express</i> (Scotland)

The Evening Express is a daily local newspaper serving the city of Aberdeen, Scotland.

<i>The Courier</i> (Dundee) Newspaper published by DC Thomson in Dundee, Scotland

The Courier is a newspaper published by DC Thomson in Dundee, Scotland. As of 2013, it is printed in six regional editions: Dundee, Angus & The Mearns, Fife, West Fife, Perthshire, and Stirlingshire. However, by 2020 this had been reduced to three regional editions for Perth and Perthshire; Angus and Dundee and Fife. In the months July to December 2019 the average daily circulation of the Courier was 30,179 copies.

<i>The Argus</i> (Brighton) English local newspaper based in Brighton and Hove, East Sussex

The Argus is a local newspaper based in Brighton and Hove in East Sussex, England, with editions serving the city of Brighton and Hove and the other parts of both East Sussex and West Sussex. The paper covers local news, politics and sport, including the city's largest football club Brighton & Hove Albion FC.

The Eastern Daily Press (EDP) is a regional newspaper covering Norfolk, northern parts of Suffolk and eastern Cambridgeshire, and is published daily in Norwich, UK. The paper also produces a sister edition, the Norwich Evening News.

The Star, often known as the Sheffield Star, is a daily newspaper published in Sheffield, England, from Monday to Saturday each week. Originally a broadsheet, the newspaper became a tabloid in 1993. The Star, the weekly Sheffield Telegraph and the Green 'Un are published by Sheffield Newspapers Ltd, based at The Balance in Pinfold Street in Sheffield City Centre.

The Glasgow Times is an evening tabloid newspaper published Monday to Saturday in the city of Glasgow, Scotland. Called The Evening Times from 1876, it was rebranded as the Glasgow Times on 4 December 2019.

The Northumberland Gazette is a weekly newspaper published in Alnwick, Northumberland, England. It serves Alnwick, Amble, Seahouses, Rothbury, Wooler and outlying districts.

<i>Isle of Wight County Press</i>

The Isle of Wight County Press is a local, compact newspaper published every Friday on the Isle of Wight. It had an audited circulation of 23,006 copies, compared to a local population of 140,500. The paper saw a drop in circulation of 13,657 between December 2009 and December 2017 (37.25%). In December 2020 the paper published an article saying that sales remained above 15,000 copies. The paper had been owned locally from its foundation until July 2017, when it was taken over by Newsquest Media Group.

<i>The Northern Echo</i> Newspaper

The Northern Echo is a regional daily morning newspaper based in the town of Darlington in North East England, serving mainly southern County Durham and northern Yorkshire. The paper covers national as well as regional news. In 2007, its then-editor claimed that it was one of the most famous provincial newspapers in the United Kingdom. Its first edition was published on 1 January 1870.

<i>Hampshire Chronicle</i> English weekly newspaper published in Hampshire from 1772

The Hampshire Chronicle is a local newspaper based in Winchester, Hampshire, England. The first edition was published on 24 August 1772, making it one of the oldest publications in England.

<i>The Press</i> (York) Local daily newspaper from York, England

The Press is a local, daily, paid for, newspaper, for North and East Yorkshire. It is published in the City of York by Newsquest Media Group Ltd, a subsidiary of Gannett Company Inc.

The Sentinel is a daily regional newspaper circulating in the North Staffordshire and South Cheshire areas of England. It is owned by Reach plc and based at Hanley, Stoke-on-Trent.

<i>The Bolton News</i> Daily newspaper and news website in northwestern England

The Bolton News – formerly the Bolton Evening News – is a daily newspaper and news website covering the towns of Bolton and Bury in north-western England. Published each morning from Monday to Saturday and online every day, it is part of the Newsquest media group, a subsidiary of the U.S media giant Gannett Inc.

<i>The Oxford Times</i> British newspaper

The Oxford Times is a weekly newspaper, published each Thursday in Oxford, England. Originally a broadsheet, it switched to the compact format in 2008. The paper is published from a large production facility at Osney Mead, west Oxford, and is owned by Newsquest, the UK subsidiary of US-based Gannett Company.

<i>Perthshire Advertiser</i> Scottish tabloid newspaper

The Perthshire Advertiser is a tabloid newspaper, published by Reach plc, in Perth, Scotland. The PA, as it is commonly known, comes out twice a week, on Tuesday and Friday.

The Craven Herald & Pioneer is a weekly newspaper covering the Craven area of North Yorkshire as well as part of the Pendle area of Lancashire. Until 29 October 2009 it remained one of only two weekly papers in the United Kingdom that continued to have a front page consisting wholly of advertisements. On 22 October 2009 it was announced that the edition on 29 October 2009 would be the last broadsheet edition with adverts on the front cover. From 5 November 2009 the format was changed to a tabloid size, or compact as the then-editor described it, with news on page one and the adverts moved to page two.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">MNA Media</span>

The Midland News Association is an England-based newspaper publishing company. Established in 1874, the Midland News Association is still one of Britain's largest independent media agencies. It publishes one of the UK's biggest-selling regional daily newspapers, the Express & Star, and its sister title, the Shropshire Star, as well as eight weekly titles and the monthly The Farmer newspaper and Shropshire Magazine.

References

  1. ↑ "Swindon Advertiser". Audit Bureau of Circulations (UK). 18 August 2023. Retrieved 2 September 2023.
  2. ↑ "Regional ABCs print: Steep circulation falls for dailies the Yorkshire Evening Post and Carlisle & News Star – Press Gazette". pressgazette.co.uk. March 2018. Retrieved 2 March 2018.
  3. 1 2 3 4 5 A newspaper to support the cause of the common man Archived 16 February 2007 at the Wayback Machine holdthefrontpage.co.uk accessed 11 December 2006
  4. ↑ Large, Frederick (1970). "A Severe Winter". A Swindon Retrospect 1855–1930 (Fourth ed.). United Kingdom: S.R. Publishers. ISBN   0-85409-592-6.
  5. 1 2 3 4 Mark Child (2002). Swindon : An Illustrated History. United Kingdom: Breedon Books Publishing. ISBN   1-85983-322-5.
  6. 1 2 The changing face of the Evening Advertiser Archived 28 September 2007 at the Wayback Machine holdthefrontpage.co.uk accessed 11 December 2006
  7. ↑ Name change for the Evening Advertiser Archived 28 September 2007 at the Wayback Machine holdthefrontpage.co.uk accessed 11 December 2006
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.