The Sunday Echo will hit the streets of Merseyside on January 19, following months of planning and research, says Trinity Mirror.
The move will also strengthen the brand’s online publishing by creating a flow of content across the weekend that will further fuel audience growth on the Echo’s desktop, mobile and social media platforms.
Steve Anderson-Dixon, Managing Director Trinity Mirror North West and Manchester said: “The Liverpool Echo is a strong and respected brand. It has a connection with its audience that is unparalleled across Merseyside.
“We already have in place brilliant local journalists, an excellent local sales force and a well-established readership which we believe will welcome the Echo seven days a week. This is a brave, energetic and, in my view, brilliant opportunity for the Echo to further extend its publishing footprint and we see this investment as a ringing endorsement of the Echo, the city of Liverpool, and its people.
“It is a wonderful feeling to be launching a print product in the knowledge that doing so will provide more momentum to our websites and our determination to be a world-class digital publisher.”
Echo editor Ali Machray added: “We can’t wait for January 19. The fact that we can do this is testimony to what an amazing city Liverpool is. Its news and sports potential are astounding and we’re determined to give its people a Sunday Echo they can savour.’
The Sunday Echo’s key components will be news and sport and it will fight for its readers and its city in the true tradition of the brand.
There will be a strong focus on high-quality coverage of Liverpool and Everton football clubs and in meeting the demand for minute-by-minute football information from the passionate support base of the two clubs.
The Sunday Echo will be priced at just 50p and the dummies produced have researched well with readers and offer advertisers an exciting new opportunity, says the publisher.
The strategy also allows Trinity Mirror to put a seventh e-edition of the Echo into the marketplace. The Sunday Echo will be edited alongside the Monday-to-Saturday publications by Ali Machray and will be presented to advertisers, key stakeholders and friends of the Echo at a launch event on Tuesday, January 15.
Trinity Mirror Chief Executive, Simon Fox, said: “This is an exciting opportunity for the group. Strengthening our weekend operation in Liverpool will both help us to enhance our 7 day digital news coverage and bring an innovative new Sunday newspaper to market."
