A great big thankyou to you lovely readers.

For the third year in a row more than half of all regional newspaper titles have increased their circulation.

Figures released this week for July-December 1999 show that 53 per cent of regional press titles increased sales year on year - with the weekly titles once again leading the way.

Yes, your Keighley News is up there at the front again.

All in all across Britain regional titles have shown a marginal decrease of 1.8 percent.

The Newspaper Society says that for the sixth consecutive ABC (Audit Bureau of Circulations Ltd) period weekly newspapers have seen positive growth. In fact, a total of 59 per cent of weeklies increased circulation in the latest period.

The success of a newspaper is still judged in the main on its sales figures. To register another increase in the face of the current explosion of media choice and audience fragmentation is, I believe, absolutely fabulous for a paper like the KN.

The great news came in a period of the year when we saw great technological changes in the way we produce the paper.

It is always difficult to single people out when it is all down to a great team effort. However, it would be wrong of me not to say a public thank-you to our newspaper sales team, the delivery drivers and of course the newsagents and retailers.

Without tempting fate, the lead we have taken is being maintained in the new millennium.

Converted for the new archive on 30 June 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.