Guardian headline news – give us your money

The Guardian has done pretty well out of its pro-European coverage of Brexit. It seems huge swaths of the 48% are turning to its website to try and make sense of “the greatest political crisis since the second world war…”

On the Friday morning after the announcement to leave the EU was announced, more than 17 million people visited the Guardian’s website, consuming 77m pages and leaving 131,000 comments.

Even the print product did well with the newspaper increasing its circulation by 70,000 on the Saturday.

It seems that in a media landscape dominated by pro leave publications, the Guardian certainly found a buoyant niche.

However, one off circulation spikes and free website visits don’t pay the bills.

With this in mind, Katharine Viner, the Guardian’s editor-in-chief has taken the rather brave step of highlighting the newspapers shaky financial situation in a prominent editorial asking readers to help fund the newspaper’s “fast, well-sourced, calm, accessible and intelligent journalism.”

Viner said: “The Guardian – like the rest of the media – is operating in an incredibly challenging commercial environment. Producing in-depth, thoughtful, well-reported journalism is difficult and expensive. But supporting us isn’t. You can do so through a monthly contribution or by making a one-off payment. If everyone chipped in, our future would be more secure.

She closed her editorial with the words: “These are perilous times for progressive politics – and at moments like these the world needs the Guardian more than ever.”

The Guardian has long sought financial support from its readership, employing various promotional activities on its website to drive donations. The more direct editorial approach takes their fundraising to a new level and perhaps more clearly demonstrated the newspaper industries dire financial state.

We have to remember that newspapers are commercial enterprises and not charities but if their only route to financial security is donations, you have to wonder how long it is before publishers change their business models and seek charity or some other form of not-for-profit status.

Can newspaper journalism be supported through “charitable” donations or is this just another desperate cry for help from a failing business model that needs to adapt to the digital age or die?