Rajasthan Patrika soft-launches edition in Banswara

Hindi daily Rajasthan Patrika has soft-launched a new edition in the district of Banswara in the south of Rajasthan. A formal launch is expected in the next few months, says Amitabh Sharma, senior manager – marketing, Rajasthan Patrika.

The soft launch is tied in with the group's efforts to test the market in and around the region, and the current edition comprises 16 pages to begin with. The likely price tag of the edition during formal launch will be Rs 2.50, says Sharma, which is the standard price of all the editions of the newspaper.

The company, however, has deviated from this pricing policy in the past when it launched the Ajmer edition at Rs 1.50. That was two years ago, and the cover price of the Ajmer edition at this point is Rs 2.50.

Alongside, the company has also set up a printing unit at Banswara to kickstart production of the edition in the region. So far, this belt, which is located at the southern-most tip of the state, was fed by the Udaipur edition - the nearest production centre from the district.

There are plans to launch more such full-fledged, independent editions. The daily currently has 11 editions in Rajasthan alone. The group has four non-Rajasthan editions as well that are published from Bangalore, Surat, Ahmedabad and Chennai.

Apart from this, the company will be also hiking its ad rates in the New Year with a 17.5 per cent increase in the overall price for both black and white and colour insertions. The per square-centimetre black and white ad rate in the Rajasthan editions will go up from Rs 421 to Rs 495, while the colour ad rate will jump to Rs 650 from Rs 550 per square-centimetre.

Figures for all the 15 Rajasthan Patrika editions are: black & white: Rs 550 per square-centimetre (from Rs 445) and colour: Rs 725 per square-centimetre (from Rs 575).

Sharma justifies the hike in ad rates of the newspaper by pointing to an overall circulation increase of 19.42 per cent for the January-June 2004 period of ABC. "Our overall circulation stands at 8,04,043, which is minus the Ajmer, Pali, Surat and Chennai editions. The increase is definitely a plus point that we would like to exploit in terms of advertising,” he reasons.

Meanwhile, Rajasthan Patrika is all set to launch a new wing called Media Max, which will specialise in providing complete media solutions to clients in the state of Rajasthan. The tentative launch of the operation is December 15-17, with the company looking to provide its expertise in outdoor, events, sponsorships as well as ad sales for print, TV, Internet and radio via Media Max.

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