New York Sun Draws 100,000 Subscribers in First 100 Days
Publisher says the Sun will be an alternative to the New York Times and that the goals of the newspaper are looking ‘attainable.’
The New York Sun says it has amassed more than 100,000 subscribers to its free daily Morning Sun and Evening Sun e-mail newsletters since its February 23, 2022, relaunch, and the publication’s leadership anticipates there will be 500,000 by the end of the year.
“I have been pleasantly surprised by just how rapidly our subscriber base has grown,” said the publisher of the Sun, Dovid Efune, who also serves as the chairman of its board.
The company Mr. Efune heads, The New York Sun Company, LLC, purchased the Sun in October 2021 from its editor, Seth Lipsky, who had led the effort to revive the Sun in 2002.
Mr. Efune said the online newspaper has set its “sights on restoring our historic role as a credible and robust alternative to The New York Times. Our trajectory so far suggests that this is an attainable goal.”
Mr. Efune lays the Sun’s burst of growth to its emphasis on stories that serve readers’ interests instead of political narratives. “The Sun’s approach to journalism is enshrined on its masthead in the immortal slogan ‘It Shines for All,’” Mr. Efune said in an e-mail.
“We have a well established tradition going back almost two centuries of putting the interests of the American people first,” Mr. Efune added. “It’s the departure from this fundamental ideal that lies at the root of the crisis in trust that newspapers writ large face today.”
The Sun’s newsroom has expanded, and notable coverage so far has included an exclusive interview with Mayor Adams and a piece on Al Qaeda training bases being established in Afghanistan under the Taliban.
Mr. Efune congratulated Mr. Lipsky and the Sun’s chief product officer, Caroline Vik, for their construction of an “impressive newsroom at a record pace” in a statement today. He also noted the role played by the company’s chief revenue officer, Ben Friedmann, in building a larger audience.
Other features the Sun has undertaken include an expanded opinion section, a weekly podcast called “Sages of the Sun,” and a paywall.
Digital memberships — which range in price between $120 a year to $2,500 a year and allow readers access to features ranging from written and audiovisual content to event invitations and phone briefings with staff — account for a significant portion of the publication’s revenue, according to the statement.
