Not buying 'Buy & Sell'

One More Thing:The publication yesterday of circulation figures for Ireland's main newspapers and magazines won't have made for happy reading at Naldin Ltd, a company backed by financier Niall McFadden and other directors of Boundary Captial.

The figures, produced by the Audit Bureau of Circulations, shows that the steady decline in sales of the classified publication Buy & Sell, which Boundary paid about €20 million to acquire in May from Associated Newspapers, continues apace.

In the January to June period, Buy & Sell'sweekly circulation declined by 7.3 per cent year-on-year to 77,277, according to ABC. In the same six-month period of 2005, Buy & Sell was selling 90,310 copies a week. The paper has shed more than 13,000 copies a week in the space of just two years.

Buy & Sell'snewspaper edition has struggled in recent times due to a proliferation of classified advertising sources, particularly on the internet.

Boundary beat off competition from a handful of other suitors, although the final price tag was thought to be high for a company reported to have annual earnings of €2.2 million. At the time of the sale, reports suggested McFadden saw good potential for Buy & Sellto develop its online presence, which it began in 1999.

It is is currently the eight-busiest ranked website in Ireland with 350,000 users, according to ABC. Unfortunately for Boundary, the competition is being led by none other than eBay, which earlier this week struck a deal with An Post for cheaper shipping rates and revealed it had 500,000 regular users in Ireland.