Sunday Independent

The Sunday Independent (colloquially known as “The Sindo”) is the most widely read Sunday newspaper in the country, with an average print circulation of about 153,000 copies as of 2020. As of 2025, its average of 481,000 readers each Sunday make it the single most read newspaper in Ireland. The Sunday Independent provides a comprehensive overview of the week’s news, offering a more leisurely reading experience than the daily publication, putting a greater focus on in-depth analysis and long-form journalism. It is broken up into News, Sport, Business, Property, and Living, as well as a magazine section which includes “Life” (Health, Food, Home, Trends, Travel) and “People and Culture” (Celebrity Interviews, Profiles, TV Listings). Despite maintaining the aesthetics of a broadsheet publication, the Sunday Independent has been described as a Tabloid Broadsheet, and has been criticised for favouring opinion-focused content over news, and occasionally tending towards sensationalism.

The Sunday Independent was first published in 1906 by William Martin Murphy, a prominent Irish businessman and nationalist, as the Sunday publication of the Irish Independent. Similar to its daily counterpart, the Sunday Independent was a Catholic, nationalist and conservative publication. The Sunday independent was run through Murphy’s company Independent Newspapers Limited, which would later become Independent News and Media (INM).

In 1973 control of INM left the Murphy family for the first time, when Kerrygold founder Tony O’Reilly bought a 28% stake in the company, and became CEO and Chairperson. O’Reilly, a former international Rugby Union player often considered to be Ireland’s first billionaire, was simultaneously CEO of the H.J Heinz Company. Under his leadership, the paper’s politics became more market liberal and economically right of centre.

Ownership was transferred again in May 2012 after Communicorp founder and billionaire Denis O’Brien gradually built a 29.99% stake in the company, becoming the single largest shareholder. O’Brien remained the single most influential shareholder until 2019 when INM was acquired by current owners Mediahuis NV, and became Mediahuis Ireland. Mediahuis NV’s shareholders comprise Mediahuis Partners NV (50.6%), Concentra (32.7%) and VP Exploitatie (16.7%).

(Last updated in April 2026)

Key Facts

Audience Share	Missing Data
Ownership Type	Private
Geographic Coverage	National
Content Type	Paid
Data Publicly Available	ownership data is easily available from other sources, e. g. public registries etc.
Operating Company	Mediahuis Ireland Limited Identifier: Company Number: IE 153066, Companies Registration Office Ireland

Ownership

Ownership Structure	The Irish Independent is owned by Mediahuis Ireland (Formerly Independent News and Media), a subsidiary of Mediahuis. Mediahuis' largest shareholders include the Belgian Baert Family (29.5%) via their 90% ownership Concentra, the Dutch van Puijenbroek Family (16.7%) via their 100% ownership of VP Exploitatie, and the Belgian Thmoas Leysen (13.25%) via his 26.5.% ownership of Mediahuis Partners NV.
Voting Rights	Missing Data
Individual Owner	Thomas Leysen 13.3 van Puijenbroek Family 16.3 Baert Family 29.5

Operating Company

Mediahuis NV
100%

Facts

Founding Year	1906
Founder	William Martin Murphy Was the founder of Independent Newspapers Limited, which would become Independent News and Media in 1973. He is arguably Ireland first „Press Baron“, having bought the Irish Daily Independent in 1900 and merging it with the Daily Nation 1905. This new publication was launched as The Irish Independent, an affordable, mass circulation newspaper. William Martin Murphy also served as a Member of Parliament representing Dublin as a member of the Irish Parliamentary Party from 1885 to 1892. A leading promoter of tram development in Ireland, he led Dublin business owners' opposition to the Dublin Transport and General Workers Union 1913 Lockout, for which he earned the nickname William „Murder Murphy“ in the Union Presses.
CEO	Sheena Peirse Sheena Peirse took over as CEO at Mediahuis Ireland in August 2025 after former CEO Peter Vandermeersch stood down. Peirse originally arrived at Mediahuis in 2019 just after it was acquired (as Independent News and Media) from its previous shareholders. She was originally appointed as digital director, with responsibility for monetizing the company’s hitherto paywall-free websites and integrating its print and digital operations. She became Chief Customer Officer in 2021. Peirse has been steeped in digital media since the internet entered public consciousness in the 1990s, initially working for an academic publisher in Cambridge and then briefly working at Express Newspapers. In both contexts she worked to transition legacy print-based operations to exploit online affordances. In 2000, she then moved to work as a producer at ITV franchise United News and Media just as it completed a £UK7 bn merger with Carlton Communications. Having worked to develop digital broadcast content there, she moved to Channel4.com in May 2003. She stayed with Channel 4 for nearly a decade graduating to Managing Editor, Online by 2010. A six year stint as Editorial Director, Online at ITV followed before she crossed the Irish Sea to join Mediahuis Ireland. Peirse has been credited with not just the shift to digital subscriptions as the core of Mediahuis Ireland’s revenue base but also the company’s broader transition to becoming audio and video producer for online/podcast markets.
Editor-In-Chief	Liz Kearney Liz Kearney replaced Alan English as editor of the Sunday Independent in April 2025. Kearney was appointed Mediahuis Ireland Group Head of Features in May 2023, having previously worked as editor of the Sunday Independent magazine People & Culture and - from May 2015 to June 2022 – as daily features editor of the Irish Independent and The Herald. She had previously as a production executive and writer in Independent News and Media (INM) having started out in the INM-owned Wicklow paper, the Bray People. She was educated at Trinity College, Dublin from where she graduated with a BA in English & Philosophy.
Contact	Independent House 27 - 32 Talbot Street D01 X2E1 Dublin 1 info@independent.ie 353 (0)1 705 5333 www.independent.ie

Revenue	Missing Data
Operating Profit	Missing Data
Advertising (in % of total funding)	Missing Data
Market Share	Missing Data

Headlines	Making a Tabloid Broadsheet Work, Irish Times (1997), Accessed on 18 July 2023
Meta Data	Circulation of 152,516 total taken from a publisher statement, reflects average sales from January to June 2020. Unable to calculate audience share as percentage figures for total Sunday paper sales were unavailable. No information about voting rights of Shareholders available. Revenue, operating Profit and Advertising not available at level of Publication. Within the media industry in Ireland reporting on income levels are generally at group level rather than individual title level. On top of this, overall revenue details for the market as a whole are unavailable. Due to these factors it is not possible to report accurately on market share for individual titles or groups. There is currently no standard audience measurement available for print and online news titles in Ireland. Individual titles publish data on readership or users but measurement parameters and sources vary between organisations, therefore it is not possible to report an accurate audience share for the purposes of this project.
Sources	Fearghal McGarry, "Irish Newspapers and the Spanish Civil War", Irish Historical Studies, Vol. 33, No. 129 (May 2002), pp. 68–90 William Martin Murphy Profile, Old Dublin Town, Accessed on 29 October 2023 William Martin Murphy: patriotic entrepreneur or ‘a soulless, money-grubbing tyrant’?, History Ireland (2011), Accessed on 18 July 2023 INM’s acquisition by Mediahuis approved by competition body, Irish Times (2019), Accessed on 18 July 2023 INM has a new name: Mediahuis, Mediahuis Website, Accessed on 18 July 2023 INM to Rebrand as Mediahuis Ireland from May, Irish Times (2021), Accessed on 18 July 2023 Court approves INM takeover by Mediahuis, Irish Independent (2019), Accessed on 18 July 2023 About Us, Ireland By Accident, Accessed on 18 July 2023 Francine Cunningham, Bird & Bird, About Me LinkedIn Profile Cormac Bourke, Accessed on 18 July 2023 News Media - A Powerful Catalyst, Kantar Media, NewsBrands Ireland, Accessed on 20 July 2023 Mediahuis profits fall by 44%, Irish Examiner (2023), Accessed on 18 July 2023 Vandermeersch named as new Mediahuis Ireland CEO, Independent (2022), Accessed on 18 July 2023 Daily printed newspapers will disappear within next decade, says Mediahuis Ireland boss, Irish Times (2023), Accessed on 18 July 2023 News Media - A Powerful Catalyst, Kantar Media, NewsBrands Ireland, Accessed on 20 July 2023 Alan English announced as the new Editor of the 'Sunday Independent', Independent (2020), Accessed on 4 October 2023 Alan English appointed as new editor of Sunday independent (2020), Newsbrands Ireland, Accessed on 4 October 2023 Profile Sunday Independent (including circulation numbers), Media Live, Accessed on 4 October 2023 Mediahuis Partners N.V, Mediaownership.ie (2022), Accessed on 18 July 2023

Headlines

Making a Tabloid Broadsheet Work, Irish Times (1997), Accessed on 18 July 2023

Meta Data

Circulation of 152,516 total taken from a publisher statement, reflects average sales from January to June 2020. Unable to calculate audience share as percentage figures for total Sunday paper sales were unavailable.

No information about voting rights of Shareholders available.

Revenue, operating Profit and Advertising not available at level of Publication.

Within the media industry in Ireland reporting on income levels are generally at group level rather than individual title level. On top of this, overall revenue details for the market as a whole are unavailable. Due to these factors it is not possible to report accurately on market share for individual titles or groups.

There is currently no standard audience measurement available for print and online news titles in Ireland. Individual titles publish data on readership or users but measurement parameters and sources vary between organisations, therefore it is not possible to report an accurate audience share for the purposes of this project.

Sources