However, they’ve managed to add over 250,000 new digital/e-reader subscriptions:
The New York Times Company reported on Thursday that nearly a quarter of a million people had purchased subscriptions to The Times website, a sign that its digital strategy was paying off so far.
Since March, when The Times introduced its model to charge online readers, The Times has signed up 224,000 paying subscribers to NYTimes.com, in addition to 57,000 others who pay to receive The Times on e-readers like the Barnes & Noble Nook and Amazon Kindle.
As the introductory rate expires and more customers begin paying the full price, which starts at $15 every four weeks, The Times expects to see more of a benefit to its bottom line.
“The digital subscription model is a long-term effort, and its full impact on revenues will be more evident over the course of the year as we progress past the early stages of the plan,” said Janet L. Robinson, the chief executive.
Ms. Robinson added that the digital subscriptions would provide the company “with a significant new revenue stream in the second half of this year.”
The announcement came on the same day as the company’s quarterly earnings report. The company said it had a net loss of $119.7 million in the second quarter, in part because of a noncash write-down of $161.3 million to reflect the declining value of its regional newspapers.
Full story at NYT.