WA Today, the Western Australian news site from Fairfax is achieving excellent traffic and is close to beating the site for The West Australian according to a report in The Australian today.
This is a very important story for newsagents. A major Australian publisher has launched into a new market and is close to beating the incumbent in just a few months. This is an extraordinary result.
In the past, when a newspaper publisher wanted to enter a market, they were up for millions of dollars. With WA Today, Fairfax has a pure online model. There is no supply chain. The role of newsagents is gone. This is the kind of move publishers need to make. Consumers want local news and from WA we can see they are happy to access this online.
Newsagents need to understand this move in the context of their own businesses. It is evidence of publishers attracting people online to access news and information. This has implications for our capital investment. It is a move we need to consider in every business decision we make. We need to be considering how we will deal with a shift in how consumers access news ane information given the number of sales every day in our newsagencies which include a newspaper.
Not tomorrow or next month will we see a dramatic fall in sales. But it is happening. I’ll have more to say on this when I publish the latest sales benchmark results in the next day or so.
Unfortunately, newsagent associations continue to remain silent on this challenge.
Dear fellow newsagent,
I’m writing to seek advice regarding home delivery. We,ve notified the publishers ( Telegraph and Fairfax) about our intention to cancel our home delivery as we are losing money.
Fairfax appears to be OK. provided six months notice is given. However, Telegraph seems to be the problem. After a brief phone conversation with the circulation manager, it appears that we could not cancel it. It also appears that shoud we cancel our home deivery we may end up losing supply for our retail business which is so unfair and blackmail.
I know some newsagencies were able to give up their home delivery. I’m desperately need some advice.
Thanking you in advance.
Im Qld based so there may be a difference. I also was told (threatened) that I would lose all supply if I gave up my run. I was also told that I had to give notice. In Qld neither is true. There is actually nowhere in the contract that makes us deliver. Become a subbie as I did, you will make much better use of the real estate in your store where the papers used to go because you will not have to follow their rules anymore. Also don’t forget that giving up your paper run does NOT mean that you have to give up your magazine run.
Corazon,
Publishers should not treat us like 2nd class retailers and keep threatening us with what we must and must not do.
I too, gave up my delivery run as it was not viable. We are in business to make money NOT lose money. Todays newsagents are not the newsagents of 20plus years ago – Since deregulation alot of newsagents had to step up their game in becoming entreprenerial newsagents to keep up with technology and ways you do business. Without your delivery run -you will have more energy to work on your Retail store and make higher margins in different categories and have a lifestyle.
Good Luck!
The challange is not whether your run is profitable – it is if you can survive the decline of the newspaper? The newspaper will disappear soon and the answer is in electronic media – An Australian Newagency Website available anywhere with links to each on-line newspaper where newsagents charge the Publisher the right to the link -and have all the advertising. A lot a work but the only alternative – iphone links, wireless free from each newsagent like at the Libraries but big potential – get together and it will survive -but learn from what Mark has been asking you for years. Keep up to date on all this website/IT stuff – it’s booming. Businessmen read their newspaper on line. They would go to a Newagency Site specific to their area -but tell them it’s coming while they still buy the newspaper.
Thanks ex Newsagent
Thank you brett, manni and exnewsagent for your info. I’ll keep you posted.