The title, published by Daily Mail and General Trust (DMGT), also claims to be the world's most-read free paper.

At a media briefing this week (25 January) Steve Auckland, managing director of the free division at DMGT, said that the business had achieved record profit and display revenue in the past year and demonstrated an 11% growth in classified revenue.

However, he would not be drawn on actual figures as the division's results formed part of DMGT's overall financial figures and are not made available separately.

Auckland also said that the title had achieved its goal of becoming the third most-read title in the country, achieving an ABC of 1.385m in November 2010, placing it behind only The Sun and the Daily Mail.

The company said that rising readership numbers, coupled with a demographic of young professionals, had made it attractive to a number of top advertisers, including all of the major supermarket names. It said because of this it is now investigating innovative advertising campaigns to appeal to these high-end advertisers.

Last year, the company ran a glossy gatefold advert for ITV which Auckland said that it had attracted new customers to the format. "We spoke to Clinique about advertising with us; we know we reach their demographic," he said.

"But they will only advertise on glossy paper, not on newsprint. Now we can do magazine-style advertising the door is opened for those kind of advertisers."