PBM ADDING QUEBEC PAPERS
By Adnews Staff
PMB Print Measurement Bureau is adding Quebec daily newspapers to its readership research. The move was prompted by the exit of seven dailies from NADbank, the national daily newspaper study done yearly by the Toronto-based Newspaper Marketing Bureau. The papers quit NADbank and PMB after the release of the 1994 NADbank results. Montreal-based Probec said the study showed an unexplained shift in readership from white collar and managerial, professional people to blue collar workers in 17 Canadian markets including Montreal. Probec has a close relationship with the Montreal newspaper La Presse which has predominantly white collar readers. It also deals Le Soleil, Le Nouvelliste, Le Droit, La Tribune, Le Quotidien and La Voix de l'Est. Probec pulled all these papers from NADbank and announced it was going to do its own readership study, after failing to gain satisfaction from the NMB. PMB president Steve Ferley told Adnews yesterday that Probec is a major sponsor of the study "but other papers are invited to participate." The PMB study will use a sample of 6,400 people in the seven Probec markets, looking at both Probec newspapers and their competitors. It will begin in the fall this year, and data will be available the autumn of 1996. This will be separate from the main PMB study which annually measures the readership of Canadian magazines and national newspapers.