We received five copies of Artist Profile magazine from Next Media this morning. This is a new title for us. Some bright spark decided to risk our money, time and space in supporting this title.
This is the problem with the magazine distribution model. Newsagents, the bankers, are forced to provide credit to publishers and distributors, take the risk of theft and give up expensive space to support titles others think we should carry. Had I been given the opportunity to decide on this title I may have said yes.
That I was not given an opportunity says that my business acumen counts for nought. Publishers and distributors who complain that newsagents are not business people ought to think about this. Their actions often deny us the opportunity to be business people.
Publishers and distributors need us and they say they like and respect our channel. They ought to show us this through fairer and more inclusive actions.
Ripped the top off and sent it bacl aLONG with all the over priced over seas cook books that arrived today
Hi Mark,
Firstly . I ABSOLUTELY understand your frustration. One point though. The newsagent acts as the banker. For the distributor. Not the publisher. The publisher acts as a banker for the distributor as well and wont be seeing any money on that title for a long time. Try 60 days AFTER the OFF SALE date for final payment. Distributors don’t gouge one way. They like to spread that pain evenly.
I am probably being a bit pedantic, but I just wanted to clarify that. Should newsagents have more of a say? Absolutely. But newsagents aren’t publishers. They are a very important part of the process though. Maybe the best way to sole these sorts of problems is to set some sort of promotional budget hurdle that publishers must pass. Something like “The newsagency channel will not stock your unproven title unless you commit to a consumer marketing campaign of $150k or pay a $25 per store rebate to each newsagent who stocks your launch”. Something like that maybe?
Seems to me the bulk of the problems in the mag distribution system lie with the distributors. So how do we fix it?
Obviously, blackballing (i.e. early returning) a publication hurts the publisher and turns away any customer interested in the title, but how does it affect distributors?