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Dec. 10th Sports dailies in France: are 3 too many? How about four?

Update, evening of Dec. 11, 2008: Paris, 20:04

Well, if three sports dailies may seem to be too much for France, how about four?
This afternoon at work here someone pointed me in the direction of an article from Les Echos (3 Dec. 2008), about the possibility of a fourth sports daily appearing in Paris on the 25 January, 2009, to be published by Robert Lafont and to be named Le Foot.

Let’s see what happens next, and, more importantly, who survives in the war of the sports dailies in France.

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Perhaps one could say that 2008 has been the “year of the sports daily” in France.

Two new sports newspapers have appeared in the streets of Paris since October.  The long held spot of the legendary L’Equipe as the only sports newspaper is now challenged by Le 10 Sport and Aujourd’hui Sport, both of which appeared about the same time in the fall, resembling each other and covering mostly football.

Both of the new entries are in the tabloid format, about 24 pages and sell for 50 cents of a euro, compared to L’Equipe’s 85 cents.  Le 10 Sport is published by Michel Moulin and Alan Weill. Weill is also publisher of our client, La Tribune; Aujourd’hui comes from the Amaury group, which owns L’Equipe, all in the family, so to speak.

While the two new entrants into the sports daily market of France sell roughly 60000 copies combined, L’Equipe apparently has not felt their impact too greatly, and continues to hold a major lead with more than 300000 copies sold nationally, although this number may vary according to specific coverage of events, such as Tour de France and Olympics. The biggest-selling issue was 13 July 1998, the day after the French soccer team won the World Cup. It sold 1,645,907 copies. The second best was on 3 July 2000, after France won the European soccer championship. It sold 1,255,633.

L’Equipe is recognized as one of the world’s most respected sports dailies, with unparalleled coverage of football (soccer), rugby, motorsports and cycling. Its ancestor was L’Auto, a general sports paper, whose name reflected not any narrow interest but the excitement of the time in car racing.
L’Auto originated the Tour de France cycling stage race in 1903 as a circulation booster.

As I look at these three dailies, I notice that the two newcomers are quite similar in their approach to news and page design: big photos, big headlines and usually a tinted box with results.
Monotony seems to be the predominant style. Neither one of the new dailies could be described as groundbreaking in any category, and, obviously, L’Equipe is not likely to suffer much from their presence.  I count about three to four pages of advertising in the new tabloid dailies, while L’Equipe seems to be packed with ads.

For the French, traditions are usually hard to break, and this is no exception.  In the Metro today, L’Equipe is still the sports daily of choice. I guess it is hard to compete with this giant of a sports daily which covers even the most minor of sports (take judo or ice skating) and gives it full coverage and prominence.

We will continue to watch what the French media calls “the war of the sports dailies”.  So far, it is an uneven match.

http://www.lequipe.fr/
http://www.asport.fr/
http://www.le10sport.com/

To read TheRodrigoFino blog, in Spanish, go:
http://garciamedia.com/latinamerica/blog/

Today, Rodrigo Fino writes about the birth of a new newspaper in Galicia, Spain, Xornal de Galicia, titling his blog “There are still those who believe in paper”

[+] info available here: xornal.com

Here I am at the end of my run today Wednesday, standing by the Christmas tree that welcomes you into the Intercontinental Paris Le Grand Hotel. It was a 45-minute run through that beautiful park, Jardin des Tuileries that starts across from the Louvre Museum is, and extends to another scenic Paris landmark, Place de la Concorde.  Even in 2 degrees, the Parisiens come out to stroll around the gardens, and I saw about four runners, too. As usual, there are the groups of young boys kicking a soccer ball around, and dozens of dog walkers. Missing this morning: the normally spotted lovers deep in a kiss or an embrace. We wait for spring for that, I guess.

 

TheMarioBlog posting #151

 

 

 

 

Posted by Dr. Mario R. Garcia on December 10, 2008