A blog on issues affecting Australia's newsagents, media and small business generally. More ...

Month: December 2005

The week in magazines

I thought I might summarise the week in magazines based on data I see from serval newsagencies and comments from conversations with newsagents.

Star – slow. Little point of sale material, it’s lost on the shelves.

OK! – Australian edition – new issue this week, selling very well.

Woman’s Day – average week.

New Idea – below average week – Oprah not a big pull???

TV Week – strong

Take 5 and That’s Life – strong as usual.

NW – soft.

WHO – very strong

Australian Women’s Weekly – good steady sales

Christmas – Family Circle, US mags, Better Homes – strong.

Melbourne Observer – weekly newspaper/magazine – a sell out again

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Uncategorized

Newsagent bodies respond to ACCC paper of public disclosure of records by Australia Post

The ACCC called for responses to its paper about Principles for the public disclosure of record keeping
rule information provided by Australia Post. A Regulatory Accounting Framework (RAF) was issued in March 2005, following legislative amendments giving the ACCC the power to issue record keeping rules to Australia Post. Under the RAF, Australia Post is required to provide annual financial reports to the ACCC for 16 defined ‘service groups’.

The RAF is important because it creates a framework through which Australia Post is more open about its divers operation and how revenue and costs are accounted for and, hopefully, any cross reliances and cross subsidies.

The ACCC has received four submissions. One from Australia Post, one from an association representing post outlets and two from newsagent associations. [Declaration: the ANF submission includes material I prepared for the organisation last year which I was a Director and the United Newsagents of Australia submission was prepared by me.]

My concern relates to the cost of attracting business and achieving each sale in a government owned PostShop compared to any other retailer. I suspect that the Australia Post brand and its exclusive mail related services draw customers into their retail outlets for a significantly lower cost and would like appropriate data to enable analysis of this. I the data reveals a problem then it could support a complaint with the AGCNCO.

It is important that the public is able to determine for itself whether Australia Post is adhering to its obligations of the Act and in particular Sections 14 through 16 relating to the permitted functions. It is my contention that Australia Post is operating significantly outside what is allowed for under the Act.

I see Australia Post leveraging the brand recognition and respect earned through its reserved services into lucrative business for its non reserved services and that this provides an unfair advantage.

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Newsagency challenges

The FHM opportunity for newsagents

I read in MediaWeek (Australia) this week that Kmart is refusing to carry FHM magazine. It’s good to know of another point of difference for newsagents. While I appreciate FHM may be considered by some to be close to soft porn, newsagents are not censors. It’s up to the OFLC to regulate such things. No, the decision by Kmart should be embraced by the publisher and by newsagents – maybe with fresh promotion to drive traffic to newsagents.

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Uncategorized

What is News Ltd doing pushing BP over newsagents?

I am godsmacked that News Ltd’s decision in South Australia to ignore newsagents for their Star Wars DVD giveaway this weekend. For over one hundred years newsagents have been the retailer of choice for publishers. While an occasionally fractious relationship, the support by newsagents for newspapers and vice versa has been extraordinary and a key reason, in my view, why newspaper sales have remained relatively strong in Australia while they have fallen elsewhere around the world.

The people at the Adelaide Advertiser have made a decision to ignore newsagents this weekend with their Star Wars DVD give away. The over the counter promotion is being run exclusively through BP retail outlets. The promotion will be supported in the press and on radio.

This promotion sends the wrong message to consumers if you want a strong newsagency channel. It undermines newsagents as the destination point for newspapers and boosts BP instead. It undermines independently owned small businesses and boosts a multi national brand. It dilutes the relevance of newsagents to other suppliers – magazine publishers and distributors and other newspaper publishers will note the News action and possibly follow.

Newsagents have helped Rupert Murdoch achieve an incredible worldwide footprint. It is disappointing to see News forget those who helped make the company great.

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Newsagency challenges

Microsoft enters the classified business

According to CNet’s news.com: “Microsoft is developing a free online service that will let people list items for sale, events and other classifieds-type of information that can be shared either with groups of friends or anyone over the Internet, the company said Tuesday.”

While this new offering from Microsoft seems to be quite different to the recently launched Google Base, that it is playing in the same space of classifieds is significant but not that unexpected blow to print media. It’s integration with MSN in particular takes the idea of classifieds to a new place and makes them more appealing to the IM generation.

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Newsagency challenges

Do under 30s read classified advertisements in newspapers?

The Editors Weblog quotes Rupert Murdoch saying: “I don’t know anybody under 30 who has ever looked at a classified advertisement in a newspaper,”. While I don’t disagree, I thought a quick quiz of the under 30s team at my software company was in order. Here is what I asked:

Rupert Murdoch has said that no one under 30 reads classified ads in newspapers? Do you agree or not? What is your experience with classifieds? i.e. – great / cumbersome / so yesterday…

Here are their responses (with names omitted):

Female: Age 27
Only the classifieds in the local leader paper for ads for Garage Sales etc.

Male: Age 28
Only to read my own ad (not a personal) when I place one. Otherwise it’s the net to find anything.

Male: Age 28
I have read them but only if I am looking for something in particular. E.g. Car or House etc. This is in conjunction with associated sites. The sites are better though!

Male: Age 27
Agreed, newspaper classifieds are obsolete! So much easier searching the net and finding exactly what you want.

Male: Age 24
I occasionally read it. I never get anything out of it. I agree to a certain extent. However, you don’t always get ALL the information from the internet. For example, if you were looking for a used car, what you might find in the classifieds you might not find on websites. Same goes for houses. I’ve been hunting for a house and though I look on the internet for possibilities, I still read the classifieds in papers … and I’ve found that some of the houses advertised in classifieds I can not find on the internet.

Male: Age 29
I agree. If I want anything I use the net to find it.

Male: Age 24
I agree with Murdoch. I don’t read newspapers fullstop. Why? Mixture of reasons come to mind ;Time, money, the environment and accessibility to information the internet provides. I think the whole newspaper demographic has changed since the arrival of the www. And the way modern society is today, today’s newspaper is yesterdays news…
My homepage is also a news site – ninemsn.com.au

Male: Age 27
I’m 27 and I don’t read the classifieds. In fact, I don’t even get the paper. I’m more of a ‘catalogue’ type of person. It’s really a matter of need.
If I’m in the market for a house or car, or something relatively expensive, I’ll exhaust every resource before I make my mind up. This includes the classifieds, Trading Post, and the internet. The upside to the internet is that if the item I want can be reviewed, it’s really easy to read other users’ opinions. The paper just does not have such information.

Male: Age 24
I will search the net if i need to purchase something (ebay or tradingpost) and if i need a service like cleaner, gardener I normally check the yellow pages. So no I don’t usually read classifieds in papers.

Male: Age 19
I don’t buy papers or look at classifieds. I’ve been to tradingpost.com.au maybe twice? I agree with Murdoch about this.

Male: Age 29
I regularly read the classifieds in the local papers when looking for local tradeys to work on our house.

Male: Age 24
I don’t read the ads in papers, if I want to read classified ads I always go to www.tradingpost.com.au or eBay.
Even for news I wouldn’t buy a newspaper. My homepage is a news website.

Female: 21
I read MX because I like the stories. I don’t read classifieds as I don’t want what they sell.

Hmm… MySapce.com and other companies recently purchased by Murdoch’s News Corp, connect well with this demographic.

According to the people in my company, Rupert Murdoch was right. I’d also suggest, however, that the under 30s are less likely to purchase most of the items advertisied in classifieds so I think this is more about need of the demographic than a judgement against the newspaper medium.

The next question, of course, has to relate specifically to where under 30s access news and while some above have cmmented on this, a response from everyone would be valuable.

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Media disruption
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