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

Month: March 2008

Magazine promotion: models

fhn_models.JPGThis week’s magazine promotion at our busiest sales counter made me laugh when I saw it. It’s fun, innovative and, well, different. Jason, the manager at Forest Hill came up with the idea to feature magazines connected with models.

On the left we have fashion magazines with models on the cover. On the right we have magazines with a different set of models on the cover – boats, planes, trains. How funny is that!

It shows we have a sense of humor. While many customers don’t notice what Jason has done, some do and they have a good laugh.  I bet they tell someone else because it is so unique.

While I doubt this display will win us any awards or kudos from publishers, it is exactly the kind of display newsagents should encourage in their businesses. It demonstrates our diversity brilliantly.  I love it!

0 likes
magazines

Compact men’s magazines

According to a report The Guardian, the UK edition of FHM is to come out in a compact ‘travel’ format – 70% of the size of the original product. I’ve heard FHM will not be alone in embracing the smaller size. If this trend reaches Australia we will need make some changes in how we display magazine product in newsagencies. You can’t put these smaller format titles in regular fixturing.

0 likes
magazines

Consistent lottery offering

wed_lotto.JPGOur Wednesday lottery syndicates tick along nicely for what is a soft lottery night. From what customers tell us, we are unique in our area offering the syndicates and while the margin is not enough to retire on, it reinforces a point of difference and a commitment to lottery customers and to Tattersalls. It certainly drives additional traffic for us. We don’t use corporate type syndicates, we prefer our home-grown approach – this works for our customers.

0 likes
Lotteries

Bill Express and ANZ merchant fees

We received a letter from ANZ today telling us that to break the current ANZ merchant arrangement which was put in place with the Bill Express relationship some years ago will cost us a $250 break fee. Up until this advice, a break fee only applied if the agreement was broken in the first two years. To have this fee imposed retrospectively is disappointing. that it’s times immediately after bad news from Bill Express is even more disappointing.

0 likes
Bill Express

New benchmark results out Friday

I will be releasing the results of our latest newsagency retail sales benchmark project this Friday.  The benchmark dataset covers eight months to January 31, 2008 and compares this with the same eight months a year earlier.  The results are very interesting and represent the most up to date set of comparative sales numbers available for newsagents.

0 likes
Newsagency challenges

Bill Express – small fry?

An interesting story about Bill Express was on page 61 of yesterday’s Australian Financial Review:

Small fry that nearly got away

The earnings announcements of many small financial services names may appear to have slipped by unnoticed in the February reporting season. But they yielded noteworthy results – some good, some ugly.

Bill-payment network Bill Express released its results on friday after the market closed. It revealed a net loss of $2.05 million for the six months to December 31, against a net profit of $3.9 million last time.

The company had a $1.8 million accounting loss on its investment in prepaid technology providor ETT, as well as $3.4 million in marketing costs for its bopo prepaid Visa card business.

Bill Express said, however, that the loss on ETT would be offset in the second half, when it sold the investment at an expected profit of more than $2.5 million.

Bill Express is using newsagents, its key retail network with 3,500 outlets, to help turn the financial situation around. Two weeks ago they announced the removal of a marketing subsidy of $250 a month paid to newsagents. This subsidy was like an income guarantee. Many newsagents only took on Bill Express because of the minimum income guarantee. The guarantee was not part of any agreement between Bill Express and the newsagents.

In response to the removal of the marketing subsidy, many newsagents are looking at how they can quit the Bill Express network. If this happens in any numbers, the pressure Bill Express is under in terms of share price will escalate. With its shares down 46.9% over the last year and 30% in the last six weeks, the last thing Bill Express would want is further share price pressure.

0 likes
Bill Express

AFL & NRL tipping competition open

Tower Systems is again running football tipping competitions for the AFL and NRL seasons. The competitions are open to anyone. Entry is free. The prizes are: First $350.00; Second $100.00; Third $50.00. To join, please follow these instructions:

  1. Go to the Tower Systems web page www.towersystems.com.au.
  2. Click on either the AFL or NRL footy tipping logos at the bottom. (To join both, join separately.)
  3. The footy tipping page will then load
  4. Click on Join, at the top of the menu on the left hand side of the screen.
  5. You will then be asked for a password to join, which is ‘tower’
  6. Click on OK
  7. Enter in your details and click on Submit Details. (Note you only need to enter information on the fields highlighted with an *)
  8. Make sure you note down your username and passwords so you can log in again later, and enter your tips!

Each week, go to the Tower Systems’ web site – www.towersystems.com.au – click on the AFL and/or NRL tipping links, enter your username and password and tip away.

Rules:

1. Anyone can participate.

2. Tips must be in by 5:30pm EST on the evening before the first game of the round, either Friday’s or Thursday’s. (No late tips will be accepted this year, no exceptions , none, nada, nope, no way, your late – you’re out for the week)

3. Failure to enter you tips will see you get the lowest score of the round minus 1 tip. (So if the lowest score tipped for the round was a 0 you will receive a score of -1 for the round)

4. To play you need before the start of the season (NRL – 14/3/08, AFL – 20/3/08).

5. Have fun.

0 likes
Customer Service

Easter cards at priceline

Any newsagent near a Priceline store ought to check out their Easter card range. Their new card supplier relationship has brought consistency to their greeting card offer. While the cards are cheap, they are packaged in such a way as to make them appeal to someone walking by.

A newsagent I was talking with a couple of days ago said he would respond with a spinner of $2.00 cards at the front of his shop. I don’t think this is the right approach. I have a Priceline opposite one of my newsagencies and I’ll leave them to play in the cheap card space. I’d rather focus on the more serious card shopper who knows quality when they see it and who wants a decent range from which to choose – the Priceline offer is very limited.

0 likes
Greeting Cards

Newsagents feature in TV campaign

newsXpress has started a national TV campaign promoting its exclusive Hot Ink offer. Running on eleven Foxtel, Optus and Austar channels, the campaign is the first I can recall by a newsagency marketing group outside the noisy Christmas, Back to School and Mid easy Sale seasons. It’s exciting to be part of this.

The TV campaign supports the direct mail pitch put into the market two weeks ago. It also ties in with the new in-store layout based around the Hit Ink branding. All of this is designed to let people know that newsXpress newsagencies are price competitive. This is important because of consumer research indicating that newsagencies are considered expensive.newsXpress members I have spoken with are excited to be part of the TV campaign. They are proud too – it is not often that newsagents are the focus of a TV campaign.

Disclosure: I am a Director of newsXpress.

0 likes
newsagency marketing

Nice pen unit from Parker

parker_pens.JPGI like this new fixture from Parker which enables us to get pens out from the pen cabinet and into the store, closer to greeting cards and closer to customers more likely to be buying pens. For decades newsagents have built pen units into their shopfits. While they look nice, they are not flexible. This Parker unit is flexible, it can be easily moved and thereby help keep the offer fresh.  This is what we need in newsagency shopfit design now – flexibility.  So, even though I am not a fan of spinners, this table-top spinner from Parker works a treat.

0 likes
retail

Easter at the counter

counter_easter.JPGWe have sourced some nice small bunnies for sale at our counter. They are proving to be a successful up-sell. Several customers have commented that it’s good to find an Easter gift which is not chocolate. We figured, what’s the point of trying to look like a supermarket or one o the national retailers. This product places us in a different space – it’s harder to price compare and there is a better feel-good factor. Some of the bunnies zip when you pull their string and others don’t do anything.

0 likes
Gifts

Real Living makeover

rl_mar08.JPGMaybe it’s just me but Real Living appears to have undergone a makeover. The latest issue certainly stands out among the crowd with its strong blue and red masthead. In among Notebook, Home Beautiful and other titles in the category, Real Living is the title you see first. We have it as a feature magazine this week on one of our aisle ends. There, it looks good, but not as good as in the magazine fixturing – this is where it really stands out.

0 likes
magazines

Changing lotteries

tatts_count.JPGIntralot has started previewing their offer to newsagents and other retailers. It looks exciting and is bound to shake up over the counter soft gambling. One challenge is how retailers who currently offer Tattersalls product navigate bringing Intralot into their business. Tattersalls has effectively quarantined real-estate at the counter. Newsagents gladly provided this when they had the full suite of products. With half the range (scratchies and some online product) soon to disappear from the Tattersalls offer one would expect that some of their real-estate would be freed. At the moment that does not appear to be an option.

I hope that common sense prevails. The last thing I want is to have to increase counter space commitment to sell close to the same value of product. I’d hope that Tattersalls releases some of their real-estate. This would be fair for newsagents and also facilitate better customer service. the last thing customers want is to have to purchase scratch tickets and online lottery products from two different places in a newsagency.

0 likes
Lotteries

Elvis rocks

The Elvis partwork is proving to be a huge success in each of our newsagencies.  It’s great to hear customers comment that they saw the ad on TV.  Marketing people say it’s important to connect with TV campaigns.  This is one reason we go hard with new partworks right at the front of the shop.

0 likes
newsagency marketing

The American Express turn off

hate_amex.JPGThis American Express stand has been outside one of our shops for at least two weeks.  I’ve bee harassed every time I walk past – and I do mean harassed.  They ask, I say no thanks and they usually come back with what, you don’t want to save money or how can you know you haven’t even looked.  If I walk past and ignore them they usually call after me with a smart-alec comment.  Do they not notice that I walk past several times in a day?  It’s a hard sell and it upsets our customers.  I have heard three people complain at our counter about the Amex people out the front.  The last thing retailers in a centre need is American Express and their aggressive recruitment tactics getting customers offside.  I wish they would go away and be banned from shopping centres.

0 likes
Customer Service

Frustration with POS Solutions

Since we sold our home delivery run we have used the POS Solutions software to collect payment of home delivery accounts on behalf of the distribution newsagent.  We have recently experienced first hand the service or lack thereof with this software.  After almost two days of down time, waiting for something, anything, to happen, the problem miraculously fixed itself without any changes being made at our end or the distribution newsagent end.  What frustrated us he most was the poor response time.

0 likes
Customer Service

Underbelly sells well

I’ve just checked sales figures for the Underbelly book we have in our three newsagencies: one has sold 15 copies, another 19 and the third 8. All in two weeks. This is the book on which the banned TV series was made. The sales demonstrate the value of being opportunistic. We’ve promoted the book at the counter, using a small footprint.

0 likes
newsagency marketing

Bag shelf promotion

mags_counter.JPGFewer newsagency designs today have the ‘bag shelf’, the flat shelf on the counter on which customers used to rest bags. We have one in our Frankston location – the photo shows half the length of the bag shelf. I thought it looked out of date and was planning for it to be eliminated in our refit. The fact is, this shelf works. Magazines sell well – even though people rest their bags and other things on there when making purchases. We’re able to promote themes (as shown in the photo) as well as the high volume titles. So, I am looking at counter options which maintain this premium display space in a back to the future move. As the old saying says, if it ain’t broke…

The reality is, over time I expect the bag rail to become redundant – in a few years as more magazine traffic moves online. So, the new bag rail will be done in such a way that we have flexibility to place other products at the counter. This is key to newsagency design today – flexibility in fixturing.

For our next round of changes the bag shelf remains.  But we may tweak it to leverage more sales from the real-estate but more on that another time.

0 likes
magazines

Late newspapers

The Age was late in some parts of Melbourne today, reminding newsagents of how one seemingly small problem can have a knock-on effect through the day. The Sydney Morning Herald was late in Sydney today too. Up there, however, the problem appears to be more than a once off. In the UK newsagents are compensated for late papers.

0 likes
Newsagency challenges

Bill Express alternative for newsagents

In response to the many calls from newsagents venting anger over their treatment by Bill Express this week, Tower Systems put an offer into the market yesterday to facilitate access to the eziPass alternative:

Newsagents angry at the removal of the $250 per month marketing subsidy by Bill Express are switching to eziPass from Tower Systems.

eziPass offers 300 electronic products including phone recharge, tourist attractions, tollway payments, movie downloads and other products. Details can be found at www.ezipass.com.au.

Access to eziPass does not require newsagents to sign a long contract. Payment for stock is made weekly and margins on some items are considerably better.

eziPass is available immediately from within the Tower Systems software, providing newsagents with a good alternative to Bill Express.

In response to overwhelming demand, Tower Systems has created a special offer, bundling Point of Sale and eziPass for newsagents not using Tower today. This special offer is available for a very limited time.

While Tower Systems is making a standalone version of eziPass available to all newsagents in mid April, many are making a move today, preferring an integrated solution.

An announcement is expected next week on a preferential banking relationship with competitive rates. Tower Systems also anticipates an announcement regarding Optus and Vodafone for its eziPass platform.

Tower Systems already serves over 1,450 newsagents nationally.

Bill Express has misread the market and, I suspect, now regrets their treatment of newsagents. They will need to act quickly to stop their retail network shrinking. In their letter to shareholders yesterday they talk about restructure. They don’t say that they expect newsagents to carry $875,000 a month of the cost of this.

0 likes
Bill Express

New art bar

A couple of days ago we installed a new art bar at our Forest Hill location. The photo below shows part of the range. We also have canvasses and other products for the art marketplace.

art_bar.JPG

The entire range if from Canson and is part of a newsXpress exclusive relationship. Art customers are efficient for the business, buying plenty of other items when they visit.

0 likes
art supplies

A facebook magazine?

facebook_magazine.JPGA Facebook magazine, yeah, that makes sense. Not! People using Facebook will find it virally, they don’t need a magazine, especially not one priced at $14.95 for less than 100 pages. If they do need a magazine then they Facebook is not for them. This is a bad offer for newsagents with a three month on-sale period. There is no hope of covering the cost of carrying the title for all but, I’d guess, 1% of newsagents.

0 likes
magazines
Trending Articles

Fairfax changes approach to TV Guide, disrespects newsagents

Published on April 20, 2011

What do you think of the Powerball changes?

Published on February 16, 2018

IPS releases new magazine contracts

Published on June 21, 2011