NY Times (NYT) Subscription Revenues a Key Driver of Growth

With rapid digitization in the core areas of advertising and growing inclination of readers toward the Internet, newspaper companies have been diverting resources toward online publications. No wonder, The New York Times Company NYT has been making consistent efforts to rapidly acclimatize to the changing face of the multiplatform media universe.

This New York-based company has been keeping pace with the changing times by utilizing technological advancements to reach their target audience more effectively. Its business model with greater emphasis on subscription revenues bodes well. The company is steadily inching closer to its target of 10 million subscribers by 2025.

On the second-quarter earnings release, Meredith Kopit Levien, president and CEO, said, “Just after the end of the second quarter, The Times crossed another mile marker on our path to scaling direct, paying subscriber relationships: We now have more than 8 million paid subscriptions across our digital and print products — a testament to the success of our strategy, the strength of the market for paid digital journalism, and our unique opportunity to meet that demand. That milestone follows a second quarter with strong revenue and profit growth and progress on advancing our underlying model.”

Subscription Revenues a Key Pillar

The New York Times Company’s paid digital-only subscribers reached roughly 7,133,000 at the end of the second quarter of 2021, rising 142,000 sequentially and 1,463,000 year over year. Of the 142,000 total net additions, 77,000 came from the digital news product, while the remaining came from stand-alone digital products, Cooking, Games and Audm.

At the end of the second quarter, the company had approximately 7,936,000 subscriptions across its print and digital products.

In the quarter, subscription revenues improved 15.7% year over year to $339.2 million primarily due to an increase in the number of subscriptions to the company’s digital-only products, which include news products, and Games, Cooking and Audm products as well as a benefit from subscriptions graduating to higher prices from introductory promotional pricing. Revenues from digital-only products jumped 30.3% to $190.1 million. Print subscription revenues rose 1.3% to $149.1 million, attributable to higher domestic home delivery revenues.

For the third quarter, management expects a 13-15% year-over-year increase in total subscription revenues and a rise of 25-30% in digital-only subscription revenues.

Closing Remarks

The New York Times Company has been diversifying business, adding revenue streams, realigning cost structure and streamlining operations to increase efficiencies. The company, which shares space with Gannett GCI, News Corporation NWSA and Lee Enterprises LEE, is not only gearing up to become an optimum destination for news and information but also focusing on lifestyle products and services.

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