City A.M.

File:City am.gif
Type	Daily newspaper
Format	Freesheet
Owner	City A.M. Ltd
Editor	Allister Heath
Founded	2005
Political alignment	Classical liberalism/Conservative
Language	English
Headquarters	7th Floor, Centurion House, 24 Monument Street, London EC3R 8AJ
Circulation	110,406
Official website	cityam.com

City A.M. is a free, business-focused newspaper distributed in and around London in the United Kingdom. It was launched in September 2005 and operates as an independent media company. Its certified distribution was 113,348 copies a day in November 2010, according to statistics compiled by the ABC. Its pagination averages around 32 tabloid full-colour pages a day.

The newspaper’s editor is Allister Heath, who joined in February 2008. He was previously the editor of The Business (magazine), a weekly magazine which closed in February 2008.

City A.M.’s deputy editor is David Hellier, formerly of the Independent and the Daily and Sunday Express. The paper employs an editorial team of 27 across its four daily sections – news, business features and investment, lifestyle and sport.

The news section is primarily made up of corporate, financial and economic stories, as well as political and regulatory stories relevant to its readership. The paper regularly runs interviews of business leaders. The news pages also contain a variety of corporate and economic comment. The business features section is primarily dominated by investment, trading and wealth management pieces but also includes a range of articles on other business topics. The lifestyle pages cover a vast range of subject matters, including travel, restaurant reviews, food, fashion, technology, books, arts, entertainment, motoring and property. The sport section reports and comments on all the major events and games, with a bias towards sports of interest to London-based professionals.

City A.M.’s launch editor was former Sunday Times and Sunday Express journalist David Parsley.

The newspaper is published in print Monday to Friday and is distributed at a growing number of points in London and the Home Counties. The company pursues a three-pronged distribution strategy, using a combination of uniformed hand-distributors and unmanned racks:
• the paper is being made available from around 6am at a growing number of commuter stations, with recent additions including Highbury, St John’s Wood and Chiswick.
• the paper is available from around 6am at many business and political centres in central London, including the Square Mile, Canary Wharf, Mayfair, Westminster and numerous others.
• the paper is also delivered to a large number of offices, such as those of PricewaterhouseCoopers or Bank of America Merrill Lynch.

City A.M. became profitable for the first time in 2010, according to official audited figures released to the UK’s Companies House. The vast majority of its revenue come from display advertising from its daily print operation but it is also building an events and digital business at www.cityam.com. Pre-tax profits were £423,000 in the first six months of 2010, with operating profits reaching £546,000.

The paper’s philosophy is broadly supportive of the free-market economy, of capitalism, of private enterprise and of the City of London and those who work in it. It endorsed the Conservative Party at the 2010 UK general election but has been critical of several of the coalition’s policies since.

Its presentation style is different to that of other business newspapers. Its front page is dominated by a large capitalised banner headline more reminiscent of a traditional UK popular newspaper. The rest of the news stories, as well as the commentary and features, come in bite-sized chunks, in a modern compact-style format illustrated with images, bullet points and diagrams.

There are now three principal free newspapers in London: [Metro UK] (which also distributes nationally) and City A.M. in the morning and the London Evening Standard in the evening. City A.M.’s is aimed at private-sector workers, especially those in finance, professional and business services and corporations, and those who are interested in investing and personal finance.