Monday 14 September 2009

Sunday madness

Once upon a time when it had a circulation that peaked at 550,000, the Sunday Sun was king of the roost for news, sports, entertainment, columnists, television guide - and layout.

The Sunday Sun, now below 300,000, is still a good read on most fronts, but recent changes to the layout have turned it into a paper jungle.

What is with the Sunday Sun now having a Sun Showbiz section - and an ENT section? Dropping ENT from the pullout section list was puzzling enough.

The flow of yesterday's Sunday Sun was downright annoying for fans of its entertainment coverage. You start with Sun Showbiz, then flip to ENT, then flip to comics and classifieds before returning to Sun Showbiz.

As Liz Braun's column heading in Showbiz reads: Uh, that is not normal.

You said it.

BTW: Can someone explain the difference between "Showbiz" and "ENT" content?

Showbiz, ENT or Showcase as in the glory years, whatever. One name and a pullout section please, for the benefit of the fine stable of Sunday entertainment writers and their readers.

You have entertainment columnists and photographers providing quality content. Time to renew the focus on packaging.

Or is PKP intent on continuing to piss off Sunday Sun print readers with changes to the formula that made it great?

Do we hear 200,000 circulation?

3 comments:

  1. PKP is gambling away the future of hi papers so I'll take your 200,000 and lower it to 100,000.

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  2. First time in 20 years that I did not buy the Sunday Sun.
    No TV Guide, no pullout sections...no sale.
    They expect us 905'ers to pay the same price for less ? Treating us consumers like your employees now...brilliant.

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  3. I agree that the flow and lack of pullouts can be annoying, but don't you remember how weekend papers work? For years, the "Showcase" section (now ENT) was printed on Friday. Any "live" entertainment stuff - late reviews, etc. - appeared on a page called "Showbiz." (The Star does something similar, putting late reviews into the news section... though both papers now often just put them online instead.)
    Having super-early deadlines for the Sunday entertainment supplement usually works - but the Toronto International Film Festival is on right now, so there is a ton of extra breaking entertainment news, and apparently it had to go somewhere other than ENT, which was filled with TV preview stuff and some earlier TIFF material.
    Adding pages called "Showbiz" seems a logical - and hardly unprecedented - move.

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