Perhaps the Most Disruptive Disruptor

The business media is filled with stories of technology or innovative business models disrupting the incumbents in many sectors of the economy. Whether it is Airbnb and hotels or Uber and taxis, the trend is well documented. Another of those is the mainstream media, particularly newspapers.

What was once a staple of the marketplace has been under assault for the better part of a decade as subscribers look for alternate sources of information and advertising is redirected to different platforms.

Here are some numbers to put this story into context. They are the latest data and come from 2018.

Advertising sales in Canada totalled $1.2 billion in 2018. That is just over half of what it was in 2014 and $400 million less than 2016. Little wonder newspapers are closing their doors or downsizing dramatically. On-line advertising has grown in that period but at less than half the pace of traditional revenues are shrinking.

And readers are moving on-line, but again at a slower pace than the loss of subscribers to an ink-on-paper product.

Source: https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/daily-quotidien/191129/dq191129d-eng.htm