In a newsagency a few days ago I noticed them selling Hallmark 2014 date books at the counter for $2.00. This is an item they got for a few cents to be used as a customer gift to help drive sales. The same newsagency had other items at the counter, also priced at $2.00, such as freebies with magazines – including a craft kit from the cover of Mollie Makes.
While the independence of our businesses is a strength, it is also a weakness. The image of every newsagency can be tarnished by the actions of one newsagency.
Newsagents selling items that should be free disrespect their fellow newsagents, their customers and the suppliers of the products involved. The same is true for newsagents who keep for themselves any item provided by a supplier as a customer prize.
The newsagent selling the date book could have been offering it to customers to drive care sales. Instead, they disconnected from the opportunity in pursuit of a small amount of revenue.
I know of a supplier some years ago that retreated from proactive engagement with the channel to barely active engagement on the back of evidence of some newsagents behaving poorly.
We keep a few of these items behind the counter and they come in handy when a child throws a tantrum. We go and give the child a toy and it does the trick every time…grateful mother/father. Only at a Newsagent !!!!
Great story Baz. Now if only the newsagent(s) selling the items would stop.
I was at a branded newsagency in a large shopping centre last week and right at the front of the store on the lease line was a table filled with hundreds of old magazines for $2 each. Some of the stickers were not even from the store so it was obvious they were selling the bagged magazines from their returns. Not a good look.