Madison magazine is not doing so hot for us. Some months it is break-even, often it loses money once we pay for the retail space and labour.
I decided yesterday to engage more with the title and help it find buyers. The first move I made was to place a quantity of Madison next to our stack of Australian Women’s Weekly. This is at the entrance to our busiest magazine aisle. I’ll see how this goes for the week and decide what to try next.
I had thought about putting Madison in a pocket above newspapers but felt that the title did not fit that location. AWW feels light a good fit to me – customer behaviour will tell me if that is right. The decision yesterday was helped by the nice contrast in colours of the covers of both magazines.
Publishers should take note of these moves which many newsagents make to help titles. Sometimes, a strategic placement is more important that a big bold display.
Madison is looking a bit inferiour to the AWW- maybe you could beef up the height of the Madison with some spare AWW’s or another title with plenty of excess stock to make it look more attractive?