I am shocked at the number of retailers, newsagents included, who are discounting premium calendars already. We are not discounting in my newsagencies and are on track to excellent sales growth this season.
Take the Michael Jackson calendar – I have this in all six of my stores at full price and it is selling well. This is in addition to the excellent pre release sales we achieved. Why a newsagent would want to discount this by 25% is beyond me. There is no sense in giving away margin unnecessarily.
The Michael Jackson is a premium item, the market has not been flooded. I can’t see any reason for the 25% off other than poor management.
There are plenty of newsagents making good money from calendars selling at full price. These operators usually have an excellent value proposition around service and range. They rely on business-based points of difference as opposed to price.
Discounting calendars now is lazy. While shoppers may like the saving, it does little for the long term health of the business.
Don’t get me wrong, discounting has a place in retail, especially for calendars. For me, this is after the New Year. It takes guts to hold this line. As I have seen in my stores over recent years, the reward is worth it.
I agree with you but i also cannot see why newsagents have the big back to school sale for stationary for school time it makes no sence at all ,we have never discounted for back to school and our sales continue to grow .Customers know they can get there back to school cheaper else where but one thing they cannot get is the service that we offer ,so why discount at the time of year that customers need the stationary ?
I agree with Shaun. We dont discount for back to school but we are known as the experts in BTS requirements and with good service and few freebies for the kids we are more then happy with the business we do.
Why discount at the busiest time of year?
Trying to get everyting under the nose of customers is difficult. We are very selective of what calendars we keep – not lazy.
At this time of year we have diaries and Christmas to promote then back to school.
David i agree i just do not get why stationary gets discounted at the busiest time of year .
Carol,
There is a corelation between magazines sold and calendars. Calendars offer newsagents a point of difference and an excellent margin. Plus they make great Christmas gifts.
Shaun S, the only reason stationary is discounted is that was the only way the big retailers could break into what was a newsagency dominated area. But instead of offering great products with great service GNS decided to copy them and offer cheap sovereign shit at below cost prices in their catalogs.
I agree we have lost the plot as far as discounting at the time of yr when we should be making money, the same goes for calendars, big retailers discount because they know that is the only way they can gain sales because their service is hopeless, but again some people think this is the only way we can compete. This mindset needs to change, I’m sick of all the loss leaders that dominate the GNS catalogs to a point that we do not offer the catalogs to customers but still see good yr on yr growth.
Good luck to all, only 81/2 weeks to xmas and we get a rest, hopefully.
I think this is called making an independent business decision….
Discounting of calendars ,by other than publishers ,at this early peak
‘OVERSEAS MAILING TIME” is simply throwing margin away,and will make “sell out ” discounting later in the season very marginal at best.Bartel offers right now a great 2 for the price of 1 @$3.00 min 80 units
RRP $9.99.This will help restore any flagging margins for Retailers.
customers are not stupid bunch.