ASSOCIATED Newspapers is planning a price war with Independent News & Media when it launches an Irish edition of the Daily Mail early next week. The UK newspaper group is planning to sell the Daily Mail for just 75c, a move that will make it the cheapest daily newspaper in the Irish market.

The Irish Independent, the biggest-selling daily here with sales of 164,000, recently increased its cover price to €1.60. There is also speculation that the Daily Mail could be distributed for free on its first day to maximise its impact. The paper costs a mere 40p in Britain.

Associated is also planning a €1m advertising campaign to promote the paper, which will have a virtually all-Irish content. It filmed ads in its Ballsbridge offices last week. MindShare has been retained as its media-buying agency.

The ad campaign is expected to kick off on Saturday, with the paper expected to hit the news stands by February 8.

Martin Clarke, a former editor-in-chief of Ireland on Sunday, will begin work tomorrow to spearhead its launch. Clarke is credited with the strong circulation growth at IoS in the early part of this decade before returning to Britain in early 2005.

It is understood that the Daily Mail is planning to print more than 100,000 issues daily. The Daily Mail’s UK edition currently sells 10,410 copies a day in Ireland and hopes to boost its daily circulation to 45,000 or more by the end of this year.

Paul Drury will move over from IoS to edit the paper with Ted Verity as editor-in-chief. The group has also hired David Quinn, religious correspondent at the Irish Independent, as a columnist; Philip Molloy, a former news editor at the Irish Independent; and several staffers from tabloids. These will be bolstered by reporters and sub-editors who are being sent over from London.

While the Irish Independent will be a prime target, Associated’s bosses are believed to have the Irish Daily Star, a joint venture between INM and Express Newspapers in the UK, in its sights, too. The Star’s sales here have dipped below 100,000 in recent months. This is the biggest attack that INM has faced on home turf. The company promised to meet the challenge head on. “Associated’s record in Ireland is played two, lost two,” said INM. “We look forward to the rematch.”

IoS has amassed losses of more than €50m and its circulation dipped by 8% in the first half of last year to 139,170. This is less than half the 291,036 circulation of the Sunday Independent during the same period.

IoS’s weekly circulation peaked at 167,996 in the first half of 2003, helped by free CD and DVD offers.

INM is also claiming victory in the battle of the freesheets. Figures from the Audit Bureau of Circulations show that INM is distributing more copies of Herald AM than Metro, a joint venture between Associated, The Irish Times and Metro International of Sweden.

Between the end of October and November 19, Herald AM was certified as having distributed 66,047 copies each morning while Metro was given an ABC of 55,196.

It is not clear, however, what advertising revenues are flowing from either title. The freesheets are believed to have had a small impact on sales of the Evening Herald and the Irish Independent.