Earlier this week Menzies Distribution issued a bulletin regarding delays and short deliveries of certain Bauer Media magazines including flagship TV title, TV Choice.
TV Choice is the biggest paid-for weekly in the country, selling more than 1m copies a week.
Bauer is understood to have switched most of the production to its own printing plant in Poland and is experiencing logistical challenges as a result.
Menzies said that supplies for England and Scotland would be limited to 80% of normal levels. At its Wakefield hub “another unexpected delay at the Channel Tunnel Calais (France) side means copies will be 24 hours late in all of Wakefield” barring the Carlisle, Kendal and York spokes.
Bauer was unable to produce the TV Choice Ulster edition “and will be supplying England edition copies instead” at 80% of normal levels, the Menzies bulletin stated.
HTV and Swansea would receive full supplies but in a split delivery with 60% delivered on Tuesday and 40% on Thursday.
Avid readers have also taken to TV Choice’s Facebook page to complain about not being able to purchase the new issue in their local shops.
Total TV Guide was also provided on a split delivery, while Best and Inside Soap were 24 hours late into Belfast.
Bauer has still not commented on the situation or how it intends to resolve it.
Menzies stated: “The publisher is working to get supplies back to normal levels as soon as possible.”
A source close to the situation said: “This problem is not going to go away anytime soon is it? Just look at the timeframes involved with bringing a weekly back from Poland, never mind the images coming out of Dover at the moment.”
Meanwhile, tomorrow’s issue of the Daily Mail on Saturday will be the first time the publisher has produced the tabloid Weekend magazine in-house on its own flexo newspaper presses as a live commercial product.
Sources said that because the plans had to be brought forward due to the sudden closure of YM’s Chantry, Pindar and York Mailing factories last week, not all of the required equipment was currently in place, and there’s a question mark over whether inserts can be carried in the title – and potentially not for the next month.
One supplier told Printweek: “They can’t insert yet, so they’re trying to fast track that equipment.
“If they can’t insert for a month that’s surely got to be the biggest financial impact of this for DMG. It's creating a massive issue for the insert market.”
The Daily Mail on Saturday sells around 1.43m copies a week. Production of the Mail on Sunday's smaller You magazine is understood to have moved to Walstead Bicester.
DMG had not commented at the time of writing.
A source noted: “Thinking about it, it would have been better if the executive management at YM had approached Bauer, DMG and the Guardian to explain their predicament and to ask for help. It probably would have worked out cheaper for the publishers, as well.”
Printweek has also been informed that due to a lack of clarity about what work had been finalised at the stricken YM plants before the administrators from FRP Advisory took charge on 31 March, an entire print run of a weekly supplement for one of YM’s clients ended up being printed elsewhere, with the duplicate print run subsequently skipped.
Separately, a number of web offset presses currently located at the three YM sites are being advertised for sale with immediate availability on the website of Cheshire equipment dealer JanusTech.
Management from Walstead Group have also been seen at the sites over the past week. Walstead has not commented on its plans as yet.
