A PROJECT REPORT ON “CONSUMER PERCEPTION REGARDING NEWS PAPER & MAGAZINE” AT TIMES OF INDIA, CHANDIGARH Submitted to : KURUKSHETRA UNIVERSITY, KURUKSHETRA In the partial fulfillment fo r the degree of Master of Business Administration (MBA) (Session: 2010-12) Submitted to: Mr. Pankaj Arora Astt. Professor MBA Deptt. GGSITMS, YNR Submitted By POONAM MBA( FINAL ) GURU GOBIND SINGH INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY & MANAGEMENT STUDIES, YAMUNA NAGAR Poonam, MBA-III, 2011 1 DECLARATION I, Poonam, a bonafide student of MBA, Guru Gobind Singh Institute of Technology & Management Studies, Yamuna Nagar hereby declare that the material embodied in this project entitled “CONSUMER PERCEPTION REGARDING NEWS PAPER & MAGAZINE” is an or ganized and original piece of work conducted by me and same has not been submitt ed in any other university or Institution for the award of any degree or diploma in any discipline. Poonam Poonam, MBA-III, 2011 2 ACKNOWLEDGEMENT “Gratitude Is Not A Thing Of Expression; It Is More A Matter Of Feeling.” I take thi s opportunity to express my profound debts of gratitude and obligations, to hono rable Director, Dr. P.P. Singh, Guru Gobind Singh Institute of Technology & Mana gement Studies, Yamuna Nagar, for his most valuable help at all stages of my wor k. His learned advice and guidance always kindled inspiration in the face of dif ficulties encountered in the course of this project work. I am also thankful to my mentor Mr. Pankaj Arora, (Assistant Professor) of MBA Department. Guru Gobind Singh Institute of Technology & Management Studies, Yamuna Nagar, for allowing me to work on this project works and for her kind help always. I am also thankful to the respondents, all my friends for their kind and valuabl e guidance, whom I consulted for my present work. (POONAM) Poonam, MBA-III, 2011 3 TABLE OF CONTENTS PART - A Chapter 1 CORPORATE PROFILE 1.1 Industry Review 1.2 Introduction to Print Media 1.3 News Print Media 1.4 News Paper Chapter 2 COMPANY PROFILE 2.1 About Company 2.2 Product at a Glance 2.3 Mission and Vision 2.4 Swot Analysis Chapter 3 FINAN CIAL STATEMENT ANALYSIS 3.1 Ratio Analysis 3.2 Comparative Balance Sheet 3.3 Pro fit & Loss Account Poonam, MBA-III, 2011 4 ACKNOWLEDGEMENT I express my sincerest gratitude to Mr. Vishal Sharma for his encouragement, sup port and cooperation extended to me during my stay at Times of India, Chandigarh . I would like to express my gratitude to Mr. Vishal Sharma for answering all the queries and to provide me with invaluable insight and guidance for my project, m aking it a great learning experience. I am thankful to all the employees at Times of India, Chandigarh. For providing me all the information and help I required for the completion of this project. I would also like to extend my sincere gratitude to Mr. Pankaj Arora for providi ng us the opportunity to do summer internship in his esteemed organisation. Poonam, MBA-III, 2011 5 Executive summary Companies often make investment in shares, debentures, bonds, mutual funds, etc. The sum of all such investments outstanding at the end of the balance sheet dat e is captured in this data field. There is one exception. Investments made by in vestment companies that are engaged entirely, or essentially, in the business of purchase and sale of securities for making profits from these are not included in this data field. Investments of such companies are treated as stock in trade and not investments. Investments by all other companies are included in this dat a field. The investments could be in equity shares, preference shares, debt inst ruments, mutual funds, or other investments such as in immovable properties, cap ital of partnership firms, etc. They could be for long-term or short-term purpos es. The total value of all such investments is captured in this data field. Tota l investments (this data field) are reported net of dimunition of the value of i nvestments. However, their break-up, in terms of equity shares, debt instruments , mutual funds, etc is reported on a gross basis. This is the manner in which in formation is usually disclosed by companies in their Annual Reports. Book value and market of quoted investments are captured separately. Other desegregations o f investments are by trade and non-trade nature of the investments and the value of marketable securities. The capture of such information is of course, subject to disclosures by the companies in their audited Annual Reports. Poonam, MBA-III, 2011 6 Industry Overview: Print Media in India Indian print media is one of the largest print media in the world. The history o f it started in 1780, with the publication of the Bengal Gazette from Calcutta. History James Augustus Hickey is considered as the "father of Indian press" as he starte d the first Indian newspaper from Calcutta, the Calcutta General Advertise or th e Bengal Gazette in January, 1780. In 1789, the first newspaper from Bombay, the Bombay Herald appeared, followed by the Bombay Courier next year (this newspape r was later amalgamated with the Times of India in 1861). The first newspaper in an Indian language was the Samachar Darpan in Bengali, The first issue of this daily was published from the Serampore Mission Press on May 23, 1818. In the sam e year, Ganga Kishore Bhattacharya started publishing another newspaper in Benga li, the Bengal Gazetti. On July 1, 1822 the first Gujarati newspaper the Bombay Samachar was published from Bombay, which is still extant. The first Hindi newsp aper, the Samachar Sudha Varshan began in 1854. Since then, the prominent Indian languages in which papers have grown over the years are Hindi, Marathi, Malayal am, Tamil, Telugu, Urdu and Bengali. The Indian language papers have taken over the English press as per the latest NRS survey of newspapers. The main reasons b eing the marketing strategy followed by the regional papers, beginning with Eena du, a telegu daily started by Ramoji Rao. The second reason being the growing li teracy rate.Increase in the literacy rate has direct positive effect on the rise of circulation of the regional papers. The people are first educated in their m other tongue as per their state in which they live for e.g. students in Maharash tra are compulsory taught Marathi language and hence they are educated in their state language and the first thing a literate person does is read papers and gai n knowledge and hence higher the literacy rate in a state the sales of the domin ating regional paper in that state rise. The next reason being localization of n ews. Indian regional papers have several editions for a particular State for com plete localization of news for the reader to connect with the paper. Poonam, MBA-III, 2011 7 Malayala Manorama has about 10 editions in Kerala itself and six others outside Kerala. Thus regional papers aim at providing localized news for their readers. Even Advertisers saw the huge potential of the regional paper market, partly due to their own research and more due to the efforts of the regional papers to mak e the advertisers aware of the huge market. Poonam, MBA-III, 2011 8 INTRODUCTION TO PRINT MEDIA Print media, as you know is one of them. Print media is one of the oldest and ba sic forms of mass communication. It includes newspapers, weeklies, magazines, mo nthlies and other forms of printed journals. A basic understanding of the print media is essential in the study of mass communication. The contribution of print media in providing information and transfer of knowledge is remarkable. Even af ter the advent of electronic media, the print media has not lost its charm or re levance. Print media has the advantage of making a longer impact on the minds of the reader, with more in-depth reporting and analysis. OBJECTIVES After studying this lesson, we will be able to do the following : identify the d ifferent forms of print media; discuss the history of early printing; describe t he evolution of newspapers in India; differentiate between print and electronic journalism. NEWSPAPERS Print media generally refers to newspapers. Newspapers collect, edit and print n ews reports and articles. There are newspapers published in the evening also. Th ey are called eveningers. HISTORY OF PRINTING Have you seen a palm leaf? There was a time when people used to write on palm le aves. This was before the discovery of paper. Some of the old manuscripts writte n on palm leaves are preserved in our National Manuscript Library in Delhi. THE FIRST NEWSPAPER Which was the first newspaper published in the world? It is very difficult to po int out a single newspaper as the first one. During the Maurya period, Poonam, MBA-III, 2011 9 NEWSPAPER PRINTING IN INDIA Do you know the old name of Kolkata City? It is Calcutta. Did you know that Calc utta was once the capital city of India? From 1774 to 1922 Calcutta was the Capi tal of India. Calcutta has also many other firsts in the history of India. The f irst Railway Company was started here.The first Metro Rail was also in this City . The first Post and Telegraph office and the first western style bank were also opened in Calcutta. Our Supreme Court also began functioning from that city. Al l of you must have heard about Nobel Prizes. Calcutta city gave the country five Nobel Laureates, Rabindranath Tagore, Sir C. V Raman, Mother Theresa, Ronald Ro se and Amartya Sen. You will find it interesting to note that Calcutta has one m ore first .