# Why did London Times go tabloid? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [November 1, 2004, 4:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-london-times-go-tabloid/272345 "2004-11-01T16:16:24Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Cunctator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/43a26b/32.png) [@Cunctator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cunctator)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2004, 12:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-london-times-go-tabloid/272345/21 "2004-11-02T00:42:33Z")
> [@BobT](#): > > Tabloid is not a term held in high esteem in American circles either. > > It either conjures up The National Enquirer and its ilk or newspapers like the NY Post, who is owned by some Australian guy… > > Forget his name … > Starts with an M. That Australian guy has been a US citizen since 1985. ---
**Author:** ![yabob](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/yabob/32/2821_2.png) [@yabob](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/yabob)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2004, 12:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-london-times-go-tabloid/272345/22 "2004-11-02T00:44:35Z")
> [@Exapno Mapcase](#): > > … > Are there any major tabloids in cities that are auto-dominated? I gave you one above. Denver isn’t known for its use of public transit, and the Rocky Mountain News is tabloid format, at least the last I knew. It apparently went tabloid in 1942. Denver used to have two major dailies competing head on - The Post and The Rocky Mountain News. They have the same owners as of 2000, but at least at the time of that agreement, they kept the Post in broadsheet format, the News in tabloid: [http://www.writenews.com/2000/051700\_scripps\_medianews.htm](http://www.writenews.com/2000/051700_scripps_medianews.htm) ---
**Author:** ![BobT](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/8e8cbc/32.png) [@BobT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BobT)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2004, 12:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-london-times-go-tabloid/272345/23 "2004-11-02T00:46:34Z")
> [@Cunctator](#): > > That Australian guy has been a US citizen since 1985. True, but it’s not like we asked for him… ---
**Author:** ![spingears](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ebca7d/32.png) [@spingears](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/spingears)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2004, 2:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-london-times-go-tabloid/272345/24 "2004-11-02T02:55:20Z")
As a starphanging commuter, at one time, the full page format suited me best. It was folded the long way to the columns you were interested in and didn’t require a lot of manipultion till you turned the page. Even then it was possible to do it single handed a large part of the time… ---
**Author:** ![Princhester](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3e96dc/32.png) [@Princhester](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Princhester)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2004, 4:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-london-times-go-tabloid/272345/25 "2004-11-02T04:53:35Z")
> [@spingears](#): > > As a starphanging commuter… I don’t know if that was deliberate or not, but it is _such_ a great word. ---
**Author:** ![Jervoise](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/d2c977/32.png) [@Jervoise](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jervoise)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2004, 9:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-london-times-go-tabloid/272345/26 "2004-11-02T09:42:56Z")
> [@Exapno Mapcase](#): > > Realistically, how can there be a large enough percentage of the population who reads their papers only on public transportation for this to make a difference? And are readers of the Times really likely to be straphangers? The Times’s largest market is London. Most people in London commute by public transport rather than attempt to drive. True, their readership is probably less-straphangerish than say, The Evening Standard’s, but OTOH I’ve seen politicians on the London train network before, not just hoi polloi. ---
**Author:** ![jjimm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ba8739/32.png) [@jjimm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jjimm)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2004, 10:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-london-times-go-tabloid/272345/27 "2004-11-02T10:09:27Z")
The Irish Independent has also started producing a tabloid format in the past few months. ---
**Author:** ![Colophon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f05b48/32.png) [@Colophon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colophon)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2004, 10:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-london-times-go-tabloid/272345/28 "2004-11-02T10:13:21Z")
> [@GorillaMan](#): > > I’d be surprised if there’s no connection with News International abandoning the Wapping presses. Not really, not as such. The decision to move printing away from Wapping was pretty much cost-based. The Wapping site is enormous and is in a fairly expensive part of London. Print works take up a lot of space, so by moving them out to the sticks they could sell off some of the site and trouser a large wedge of cash. I don’t know whether that is the plan though. The new presses are likely to be so all-singing-all-dancing that News International could print The Times on individual grains of rice if they chose. Tabloid or broadsheet would be no problem. However the logistics of designing _two_ editions of every paper, and selling the different ad shapes, are pretty horrendous, so you can see why they would want to switch. Tabloid is more popular, so that’s what won out. AFAIK there are no plans for The Sunday Times to go tabloid - apart from anything else it would end up about two foot thick! (Like it’s not already) ---
**Author:** ![Derleth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Derleth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Derleth)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2004, 11:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-london-times-go-tabloid/272345/29 "2004-11-02T11:56:43Z")
> [@Princhester](#): > > > [@spingears](#): > > > > As a starphanging commuter… > > I don’t know if that was deliberate or not, but it is _such_ a great word. Especially if you pronounce it STARfanging. 😉 (No, I’m not a Greek, merely a geek.) As to tabloids vs. broadsheets, I associate tabloids with the lower-priced types of publications, like sensationalist screedsheets and free indie papers printed by college students and other radical groups. Broadsheets are usually the more traditional papers, like the main local daily. (And, yes, I’ve always lived in towns with _one_ local daily.) The term tabloid, however, means sensationalist screedsheet unless you are actually working in the newspaper business. Nobody I know would call a college paper a tabloid, even if it was indeed printed in tabloid form. ---
**Author:** ![Carnac\_the\_Magnificent](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ccd318/32.png) [@Carnac\_the\_Magnificent](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Carnac_the_Magnificent)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2004, 1:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-london-times-go-tabloid/272345/30 "2004-11-02T13:32:53Z")
> [@seosamh](#): > > The Times is not the best selling “quality” daily newspaper in the UK. It currently sells about 650,000 a month. > > The Daily Telegraph tops the list with 900,000 sales a month. It has never been available as a tabloid and, as far as I know, there are no plans to change this in the foreseeable future. Okay, I’m missing something here. When you say “The Times,” do you mean what some mistakenly call “The London Times”? And are you sure you’re citing MONTHLY circulation figures? My impression has always been that The Times is far and away the best, most pretigious newspaper in the UK, bar none. FYI, here are the circulation figures for US newspapers for 2004. (At the 650,000 monthly you’re citing, that would seem to translate to roughly 20,000 per day, which is tiny.) The New York Times’ circulation is more than 1.1 daily, or about 30 million per month. (I have no comment on the presumed quality of some of these US newspapers.) Average daily circulation of nation’s 20 biggest newspapers for six months ended Sept. 30, 2004 1. USA Today, 2,309,853, up 2.8 percent 2. The Wall Street Journal, 2,106,774, up 0.8 percent 3. The New York Times, 1,121,057, up 0.2 percent 4. Los Angeles Times, 902,164, down 5.6 percent 5. New York Daily News, 715,052, down 1.6 percent 6. The Washington Post, 707,690, down 3 percent 7. New York Post, 686,207, up 5.2 percent 8. Chicago Tribune, 600,988, down 2 percent 9. Houston Chronicle, 554,783, up 0.3 percent 10. San Francisco Chronicle, 468,370, down 8.5 percent 11. The Boston Globe, 451,471, up 0.2 percent 12. The Arizona Republic, 413,268, down 4.4 percent 13. The Star-Ledger of Newark, N.J., 400,042, down 2.1 percent 14. The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, 397,097, up 3.8 percent 15. Star Tribune of Minneapolis-St. Paul, 381,094, up 0.2 percent 16. The Philadelphia Inquirer, 368,883, up 0.1 percent 17. The Plain Dealer, Cleveland, 354,309, down 3 percent 18. Detroit Free Press, 348,838, down 1.1 percent 19. The San Diego Union-Tribune, 339,032, down 3.7 percent 20. The Oregonian, Portland, 337,707, up 0.9 percent ---
**Author:** ![GorillaMan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/50afbb/32.png) [@GorillaMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GorillaMan)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2004, 1:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-london-times-go-tabloid/272345/31 "2004-11-02T13:41:58Z")
> [@Carnac the Magnificent!](#): > > Okay, I’m missing something here. When you say “The Times,” do you mean what some mistakenly call “The London Times”? Yes. (Just to clear this up, it’s never ever called “The London Times”. But The Times of London is valid, as all you’re doing is describing it’s location 😃 ) > [@](#): > > And are you sure you’re citing MONTHLY circulation figures? No, they’re daily figures: ``` Circulation Number of readers ``` The Guardian 403,306 1,102,00 2.7 The Times 715,310 1,564,000 2.2 The Daily Telegraph 1,017,797 2,280,000 2.2 Financial Times 486,366\* 615,000\* 1.3 The Independent 225,639 567,000 2.5 Daily Mail 2,428,260 5,605,000 2.3 Daily Express 963,147 2,318,000 2.4 The Sun 3,499,882 9,497,000 2.7 The Mirror 2,179,105\* 5,622,000\* 2.6 Daily Star 579,584 1,451,000 2.5 My impression has always been that The Times is far and away the best, most pretigious newspaper in the UK, bar none. FYI, here are the circulation figures for US newspapers for 2004. (At the 650,000 monthly you’re citing, that would seem to translate to roughly 20,000 per day, which is tiny.) The New York Times’ circulation is more than 1.1 daily, or about 30 million per month. (I have no comment on the presumed quality of some of these US newspapers.) Average daily circulation of nation’s 20 biggest newspapers for six months ended Sept. 30, 2004 1. USA Today, 2,309,853, up 2.8 percent 2. The Wall Street Journal, 2,106,774, up 0.8 percent 3. The New York Times, 1,121,057, up 0.2 percent 4. Los Angeles Times, 902,164, down 5.6 percent 5. New York Daily News, 715,052, down 1.6 percent 6. The Washington Post, 707,690, down 3 percent 7. New York Post, 686,207, up 5.2 percent 8. Chicago Tribune, 600,988, down 2 percent 9. Houston Chronicle, 554,783, up 0.3 percent 10. San Francisco Chronicle, 468,370, down 8.5 percent 11. The Boston Globe, 451,471, up 0.2 percent 12. The Arizona Republic, 413,268, down 4.4 percent 13. The Star-Ledger of Newark, N.J., 400,042, down 2.1 percent 14. The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, 397,097, up 3.8 percent 15. Star Tribune of Minneapolis-St. Paul, 381,094, up 0.2 percent 16. The Philadelphia Inquirer, 368,883, up 0.1 percent 17. The Plain Dealer, Cleveland, 354,309, down 3 percent 18. Detroit Free Press, 348,838, down 1.1 percent 19. The San Diego Union-Tribune, 339,032, down 3.7 percent 20. The Oregonian, Portland, 337,707, up 0.9 percent [/QUOTE] ---
**Author:** ![GorillaMan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/50afbb/32.png) [@GorillaMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GorillaMan)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2004, 1:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-london-times-go-tabloid/272345/32 "2004-11-02T13:50:59Z")
> [@Carnac the Magnificent!](#): > > Okay, I’m missing something here. When you say “The Times,” do you mean what some mistakenly call “The London Times”? Yes. (Just to clear this up, it’s never ever called “The London Times”. But The Times of London is valid, as all you’re doing is describing it’s location 😃 ) > [@](#): > > And are you sure you’re citing MONTHLY circulation figures? No, they’re daily figures: > [@](#): > > My impression has always been that The Times is far and away the best, most pretigious newspaper in the UK, bar none. That’s the traditional view of it - but the four serious papers are all prestigious, all are capable of breaking big stories, and all have serious political clout. (And I suppose we shoul be talking about the Financial Times as well, despite it’s obvious specialism). Here’s the official circulation figures - the second column is the total which are purchased at full price, rather than bulk purchases or giveaways, which gives a better idea of true popularity: Telegraph 856 ,000 496,000 Guardian 331,000 299,000 Times 623,000 482,000 Independent 228,000 189,000 Financial Times 135,000 100,000 (from [www.abc.org.uk](http://www.abc.org.uk)) ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2004, 2:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-london-times-go-tabloid/272345/33 "2004-11-02T14:55:55Z")
> [@BobT](#): > > The paper is not the London Times. It is The Times. Pointless nitpick. We refer to all kinds of things using names that are not their “proper” names. It’s perfectly okay in informal speech to call it the “London Times” in order to be clear about what Times newspaper is being referred to. ---
**Author:** ![GorillaMan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/50afbb/32.png) [@GorillaMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GorillaMan)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2004, 3:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-london-times-go-tabloid/272345/34 "2004-11-02T15:08:21Z")
> [@acsenray](#): > > It’s perfectly okay in informal speech to call it the “London Times” in order to be clear about what Times newspaper is being referred to. That would be true, if it’s name was “Times”. It’s not, it’s “The Times”, so you can actually refer to it with it’s real name, as I’ve already said, by calling it The Times of London. ---
**Author:** ![Gyrate](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gyrate/32/3588_2.png) [@Gyrate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gyrate)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2004, 3:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-london-times-go-tabloid/272345/35 "2004-11-02T15:17:31Z")
Continuing the nitpick, the form I usually encounter is **The Times (London)**. YMM and obviously does V. ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2004, 3:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-london-times-go-tabloid/272345/36 "2004-11-02T15:39:12Z")
And just to play along with the nitpick, I called it the London Times in the title because it was the easiest way to distinguish it, since almost all U.S. readers would think the Times unmodified is The New York Times. I suppose I could have been pedantic and said The Times of London, but I didn’t bother. ---
**Author:** ![Jplacer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/85f322/32.png) [@Jplacer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jplacer)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2004, 11:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-london-times-go-tabloid/272345/37 "2004-11-02T23:31:10Z")
I work at a newspaper. We went to a smaller size about 2 years ago. It has very little to do with making the paper eaiser to read. It is all about the money. The price of paper has risen and to cut costs, newspapers shrunk the size of the paper so they could use less. So instead of ordering paper every 2 months, a roll will last 2 more months. Since the price of advertising stays the same, the newspaper makes more money. ---
**Author:** ![Princhester](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3e96dc/32.png) [@Princhester](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Princhester)\ **Post date:** [November 3, 2004, 12:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-london-times-go-tabloid/272345/38 "2004-11-03T00:54:21Z")
> [@Jplacer](#): > > I work at a newspaper. We went to a smaller size about 2 years ago. It has very little to do with making the paper eaiser to read. It is all about the money. > > The price of paper has risen and to cut costs, newspapers shrunk the size of the paper so they could use less. So instead of ordering paper every 2 months, a roll will last 2 more months. Since the price of advertising stays the same, the newspaper makes more money. I don’t understand this. As I understand it, the entire content (tabloid/broadsheet) is brought across from one format to the other, and I don’t think font size decreases. The newspaper just gets thicker. So how is paper saved? ---
**Author:** ![Jplacer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/85f322/32.png) [@Jplacer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jplacer)\ **Post date:** [November 3, 2004, 1:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-london-times-go-tabloid/272345/39 "2004-11-03T01:04:48Z")
> [@Princhester](#): > > I don’t understand this. As I understand it, the entire content (tabloid/broadsheet) is brought across from one format to the other, and I don’t think font size decreases. The newspaper just gets thicker. So how is paper saved? Sorry I didn’t make myself very clear. The paper I am at went from a broadsheet to a smaller broadsheet, Not to a pure tabloid size. ---
**Author:** ![GorillaMan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/50afbb/32.png) [@GorillaMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GorillaMan)\ **Post date:** [November 3, 2004, 1:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-london-times-go-tabloid/272345/40 "2004-11-03T01:21:12Z")
> [@Jplacer](#): > > Sorry I didn’t make myself very clear. The paper I am at went from a broadsheet to a smaller broadsheet, Not to a pure tabloid size. So all they did was reduce the content? Which could just have easily been done by printing less pages? There must have been another reason for changing size. (In the British examples being discussed, the content has remaind identical across the change of format.) [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-london-times-go-tabloid/272345.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-london-times-go-tabloid/272345.md?page=3)