I think NMG bought out The Weekly Advertiser and made it Daily Metro? The Weekly Advertiser concept was doing so well (why else did NMG buy it?) so why did they change the formulae?

Since the NMG and SGL are complementary,should they merge?

What about NMG's operations in Ug and Tz,are they struggling too?

Yes; NMG bought the weekly advertiser many years ago. The previous owners were making good money running it as a strictly advertising paper with no stories.

Then NMG took it over and started running stories....advertising revenue went down,staff costs went up (reporters,editors etc) and in a few moths,it became a loss-maker.

The kept running it that way for a few years and then Pat Quarcoo started his Nairobi Star. Initially this was printed at the NMG printing press. They watched the print runs and realised there is money to be made.

In one week,they changed the Weekly Advertiser into the Daily Metro -same editors,same reporters plus some additions. Costs went higher,circulation came tumbling down..and with it advertising revenue disappeared all together.

And before they knoew it,Quarcoo bought himself a printing press....thus the printing revenue from the Star also dried up.

Wacha mchezo!

I posted an answer to your question 12 minutes BEFORE you asked it.

Kwani huangalii current threads?

@Mukiha

I think they had the wrong target group or wrong material for their target group. For 20bob it targeted the low income earners and the content therein,one would be forgiven to think it was intended for the group not looking for anything serious in the newspaper. Now,the low earner will not waste his precious 20bob for useless info. he'd rather stand at the vendor's kiosk for an hour to read the DN or TS instead. If you now add color on all pages,you are just adding more cost into it which does not match the returns.

They just jumped into price war with the NS without proper strategy wit price being the only competitive advantage.

Problem with NMG is that they are reactors.
Some deals are like glass. Sometimes it's better to leave them broken than try to hurt yourself putting it back together.

First step is to totally divorce BD from the [Daily] Nation....remove its office from Nation Centre to some leased premises,give it separate admin staff,etc. Then give some seed capital let it swim alone.

If it can survive,well and good. if it cannot,still well and good!