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Publisher Tony Hunter told his staff in a memo that “circulation declines were impacted by price increases, curtailment of distribution territories, the redesign, presidential endorsement and an overall reduction in subscription sales ‘pressure.’”
It’s an interesting admission. In a letter to readers in January, editor Gerould Kern said that before launching the redesign, the Tribune “listened carefully to what you said you wanted in your Tribune, and the new format was created to meet those needs.” Not only that, “based on your comments and our own rigorous self-evaluations, we’ve made a number of important changes.”
I do believe the Obama endorsement also gained the Tribune new subscribers and helped it hang on to old ones. I haven’t heard from anyone whose reaction to the reformatted Tribune was, “About time.”
