Print on recovery road, pin high hopes on festive season: Industry heads

NEW DELHI: The Covid2019 pandemic threw the print publication industry into crisis. When the lockdown was imposed, circulation was severely impacted in major cities which caused newspapers to go into survival mode. Buffeted by declining readership, print companies resorted to cost-cutting, downscaled manpower, put investments on hold and channelled resources into the digital landscape. The industry took lessons from this experience, and kept the ball rolling.

Now, six months later, the print industry is on the way back to normalcy, experimenting with new opportunities, and scaling the business for the future.

At Pubnation, the virtual roundtable organised by Indiantelevision.com, industry heads and representatives from leading media houses - The Hindu chief revenue officer Suresh Balakrishna; Malayala Manorama VP marketing and ad sales Varghese Chandy; Punjab Kesari Group director Abhijay Chopra; Sakshi Media Group ED & CEO Vinay Maheshwari; HT Media Ltd executive director Rajeev Beotra; The Pioneer general manager Gurudatta Jha - discussed the new hopes the print business is looking forward to, what monetisation models can publishers’ experiment with, and expectations from the festive season. The session was moderated by indianielevision.com founder, CEO and editor-in-chief Anil Wanvari.

With the economy gradually recovering from the aftershocks of the pandemic, newspaper publishers are witnessing an all-time high market consumption. According to Malayala Manorama’s Varghese Chandy, there is no drop in circulation, and the business for them is growing month-on-month in terms of getting advertisements.

HT Media Ltd executive director Rajeev Beotra echoed the same thought, saying: “Each month is better than the previous one. The language dailies did not see any disruption in distribution, they were pretty much stable. The disruption was confined to large metros and big cities. English publication got a little impacted, but from a revenue standpoint we are doing well. We are on a good track, and the focus is to drive the growth engine.”

The Hindu chief revenue officer Suresh Balakrishna acknowledged that the company took some cost-cutting measures during the lockdown period, when advertising was a complete washout. He also noted a curious anomaly in circulation figures amid the pandemic. “We had a sort of mix reaction during the time – Kerala, Andhra Pradesh, and Telangana were reasonably unaffected in terms of circulation but in states like Karnataka and Tamil Nadu circulation numbers went down in April, May, and June and then we had to bring them back gradually in the unlock phase.”

In terms of advertising, the publication registered a month-on-month progress of the graph, and August and September were particularly good for the business, with things looking up ahead of the festive season, Balakrishna added.

Sakshi Media Group ED & CEO Vinay Maheshwari agreed that the market is opening up a little, and it did not encounter many challenges in Andhra and Telangana on the circulation front, but the Hyderabad market was a stumbling block. “The impact has been more on English dailies in contrast to regional and Hindi dailies, but now we are doing fairly well and advertisers are showing interest again which is a good sign for the business and the overall industry.”

Declaring that the worst is over, The Pioneer general manager Gurudatta Jha also pointed out some unexpected setbacks. “Education and real estate were counted as big properties in terms of advertisement but the business is not coming from that side. But then there are new opportunities which are helping the business. We will do better as time progresses.”

Festive demand

Most of the newspaper houses are hopeful that the festive season will bring a little cheer for the industry, and advertisers will leverage the print medium, as they do every year.

“Diwali is the biggest money-maker for us, followed by the wedding season. We might not see a rush in the market but segments like paints, edtech, electronic goods are doing very well due to demand across various products. The use of technology adoption is leading to a new wave of consumption. That is going to translate into advertisements,” said Punjab Kesari Group director Abhijay Chopra.

Besides edtech companies, advertising from the auto sector, especially during the auspicious Navratri-Diwali period, is also on the rise, said Balakrishna.

“I was not expecting car sales to go up so fast but it is growing, 2-wheelers have also become very important. These are the pocket of opportunities that have come up for us. In the Diwali seasons, we expect categories like edtech, automobile, e-commerce participating big this time, and the season will offer more opportunities. However, we need to learn to handle this new ecosystem better,” added Balakrishna. 

Chandy held the view that people were reluctant and advertisers were apprehensive about putting money in Onam, but those who have invested money are reaping the benefits. “Advertisers should utilise this opportunity as there is a pent-up demand now, and people are buying across categories.”

Beotra, too, is keen to make hay while the sun shines. “In this year’s IPL, we have seen very different forms of advertisers. While some traditional advertisers may be conspicuous by their absence, several other edtech players are becoming a huge category. This will continue to be a disruptive, volatile world for a long time to come. We will have to be vigilant and look for opportunities.”