When we moved to our temporary location a few months ago, we had no choice but to shoe-horn magazines into fixtures which were designed for greeting cards.
One side of the new magazine aisle was made up of sections, such as the one shown in the photo. This made us look differently at title adjacencies and while we were left with some challenges due to space, the result was tighter sections targeting common interests.
While I like the idea of the segmented areas, I know that tenancy and other costs make this less efficient allocation of space unrealistic for newsagencies of the future.
That said, the smaller sections have made it easier to watch shopper interaction and title performance with a narrower focus.
The segmented experience, the tighter space and going from 1,250 titles to 750 titles has reinforced for me the importance of ensuring that newsagency shop fits are flexible so that configurations can change with need and that floor space allocation can change to reflect margin dollars return.
Installing a purpose built magazine fixture which cannot be easily changed without construction of any sort is nuts.
The other reminder is that of change in the magazine department. Even over the last five months, we have moved sections in pursuit of better sales. This must be an on-going process in any newsagency. It is certainly a way of demonstrating a point of difference over our planogram-centric competitors,.