It is harmless to poke fun at competitors

Has Torin Douglas lost his renowned sense of humour and are we in a business where a bit of hyperbole never hurt anyone?

As long as I have worked in newspapers, and particularly since the publication of monthly ABC figures for national newspapers, in effect the ABC’s Premiership, newspaper editors have relished telling their readers how well they are doing as well as poking a bit of fun at their competitors.

I am sure that those readers who are interested in the figures find it interesting and those who are not take no offence.

In the industry, those of us who use the figures to sell and buy with and evaluate trends pore over the ABC data and make our professional assessment.

The Mirror has been improving its sales and readership successfully through the course of the past two and a half years and we are proud of the sales stability, which the paper is now showing and which has been acknowledged by analysts in both the media village and the City.

The success we have achieved has been at a premium price to The Sun, which makes it even more rewarding, and now, after years of remaining at a 2p advantage, The Sun has joined us (apart from Saturdays) to create a level playing field, so it is all to play for.

For the record, The Mirror, in regular qualitative and quantitive research, comes out head and shoulders over its competitors for being an honest and trustworthy paper, and we are equally proud of the trust which our 6.3 million readers put in us.

Also for the record, Mirror readers are different to Sun readers, and while seven syllable words might confuse Sun readers, The Mirror’s readers are interested in the broader issues of life and enjoy the quality of writing of award winning journalists, such as Anton Antonowicz, Brian Reade, Victor Lewis-Smith and Tony Parsons, just to mention four who use the English language so effectively in their editorials.

It is clearly about time we had a beer to tease back Torin’s renowned sense of humour.

Roger Eastoe

Managing director

Mirror Group

London E14