Catherine Woodside, director of circulation at News Limited says, “These results were achieved despite consecutive interest rate increases, rising inflation and unemployment and in an environment in which consumer confidence is at a 16 year low and home loan applications at a 17 year low.”

The Australian and The Weekend Australian were among less than a handful of newspapers to achieve growth, with circulation on weekdays up 2.3 per cent and on weekends up 0.5 per cent.

In Melbourne, both The Sunday Age and the Sunday Herald-Sun generated modest sales growth.

Elsewhere on weekends – when consumers have scaled back driving, shopping and leisure activities – News Limited titles were down, according to Woodside.

She says, “The most noticeable impact on Saturdays reflects lower consumer demand for real estate and motor vehicles while on Sundays, we have seen rising petrol and retail prices curb discretionary spending by consumers on everything from appliances to newspapers, magazines, entertainment and sport.”

Woodside adds Monday to Friday sales had fared better, declining only 0.9 per cent for the period, a very reasonable achievement given the slowdown. The only region to escape the downturn was the Northern Territory, where sales across the week were up.

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