Newspaper shoppers in Melbourne are confused with the similarly looking offers today.
Based on shopper reaction today, that the only way they tell the difference between the two is the format. With The Sunday Age appearing to be a tabloid today – thanks to the AFL grand final wraparound – the obvious different is lost.
The key factor in them looking the same is the identical advertising from Virgin Australia – kudos to them for such blanket coverage.
Good retail management software lets retailers see what sells with a product and how often a product is sold alone. This enables the retailer to gauge the basket efficiency of a product.
In a newsagency, newspapers and lottery products are the most inefficient products – the products most often sold alone. On average, newspapers are sold alone 75% of the time. Lottery-only product purchases occur, on average 70% of the time. These numbers are not good for newsagents.
The key to making products more efficient is to have data for your business. Got to your software and produce the report for the last three months. Loot at your least efficient product and develop a plan for driving their efficiency – driving the purchase of other items with them.
Today, September 30, is the day of celebrating the Mid-Autumn Festival for many Asian cultures this year. Smart retailers serving a strong Asian constituency will acknowledge this is some way today.
Needing a new paid of runners I went to a well-known sports outlet on Friday, selected the style I wanted and asked to try them on in my size. The well-trained sales associated wanted to measure my feet to be sure. Next, I was asked to walk and then put on some device to assess which parts of each foot carried the most weight. The result was a recommendation for an inner sole for better support. I declined the offer.
While waiting for my size to be found in the back room, I noticed that placed in with the runners on display were displays of inner soles. I also heard two other employees make the same recommendation of inner soles for support to other shoppers.
The cynic in me had me wondering whether the walking, measuring and weight balance device test were all about selling inner soles. I checked these products – they were a generic brand, made in China and therefore probably delivering an excellent margin. Between my realisation and completing the purchase I saw the pitch repeated several times more – in the name of excellent customer service … to make sure we get the right product for your feet and type of walk.
A glance around the shop showed several people with the promoted supports in their hands. The pitch works – it must otherwise they would not push it as they do.
While I am sure some newsagents train their staff to provide excellent customer service in recommending items to go with items already selected by shoppers, I wonder if we have down as well as this sports shoe store. The follow-up question is whether we would want to. I know newsagents are challenged getting employees to make offers across the counter.
My experience was a reminder of the importance in adding every dollar possible to a purchase and structuring the business for this to be done in a way that fits with the business and is easy. I wonder how many people have purchases these inner sole supports who did not really need them.
We moved reading glasses yesterday – down deep into our magazine department. While the glasses are selling well, we need the space at the front of the shop for Halloween and other promotions. Locating it with magazines makes sense as this is where shoppers are more likely to notice that they have an eyesight problem.
Jumbo Interactive Limited (ASX: JIN), has announced the signing of a five year agreement with Tatts Lotteries Northern Territories to facilitate the sale of lottery games for the Company’s website.
Lottery retailers need to be across the migration online of lottery sales.
Promoting Halloween at the front of the newsagency through school holidays has been working well for us as it attracts plenty of new shoppers to the business.
Once attracted across the mall to our business there is plenty else for first-time to see and consider in-store … and they do.
While there is some crossover between our Halloween range and that carried by others in the centre, we have plenty of unique product, a competitive price point and a more engaging display.
We are targeting at least 25% growth this year over last for Halloween. We have set ourselves up for this with more product and changes to our promotion of the season. The photo shows just part of our Halloween range.
With a margin of between 50% and 65% and with broad shopper appeal, it makes sense to use prime retail space at this time of the year to promote Halloween.
Clicking on the image will give you a larger version.
The Superfan’s Guide to One Direction magazine will sell out for us this morning and we are hoping to have extra stock by Wednesday. It’s been selling very well for us – like all One Direction product.
We have driven, chased, the success through tactical placement at the front of the shop as well as with teen magazines. It’s the only to go with these titles aimed at teen and pre-teen shoppers. Selling out in ten days is a good commercial outcome. We are very happy.
Plenty of newsagencies open this afternoon will be in for a quiet time with the AFL grand final in full swing. We will be open and using the opportunity to get some housekeeping done – moving displays and reconfiguring the shop. It’s always a good day for this type of work. Some cool shoppers come out too, revelling the experience a quieter shopping experience for a Saturday afternoon.
PS. I’m tipping the Swans.
It’s disappointing that Woolworths paid to deface the Grand Final issue of The Age newspaper today with another of their ads stuck over the masthead of the newspaper. Talk about respecting your brand! Yes the newspaper needs to make money – but still! I was pleased when a customer yesterday ripped the ad off saying that Woolworths is ruining everything.
The federal government has announced that it will move recruitment advertising from print to online, recognising that online is the preferred medium for employment advertising.
I noticed WHAT’S IT WORTH NOW?, this small format magazine our shelves yesterday. We received two copies – the first time we have had the title.
Magazine distributors should not be able to send a new title (to us) without our permission. Maybe in the past but not now. The trading terms of yesterday year do not apply today … they don’t work today.
Since we carry the financial obligation, pay for the retail space, pay for the labour and pay to return stock that fail, we should not be sent any new title unless we agree.
T2020 is evidence that the newsagency channel has cha need significantly. Magazine distributors need to realise that they are now dealing with a more commercially focused newsagency channel. Abusing a system based on out of date practices does not cut it any more.
Yes, many titles will not get onto shelves because newsagents will say no. The fault for that lies with magazine distributors who even today distribute hundreds of titles that are loss-making for newsagents.
Whether I would have taken this title or not is not the point – given my investment in the title I ought to have been asked. For the record, I’d have said no: it’s too small, too expensive, on sale for too long and not something I can make enough from to take up a pocket.
While we have the first issue of the One Direction five part series in several locations, it is this placement at the front of the store that is working a treat. One customer yesterday purchased the magazine, a poster and two calendars – a very nice sale indeed from a passer-by.
While not a large billboard display – this tactical placement by the team on the lease line is working a treat for us. We have found this to be the best approach for promoting all things One Direction.
We are also using social media, primarily Twitter, to promote these and other One Direction products. Fans will travel to get what they want.
We are promoting the latest issue of Girlfriend magazine with this aisle end display at the entrance to our women’s aisle.
The free aviator sunglasses are a terrific gift and best promoted outside the usual magazine fixturing – they are something shoppers need to see to get the value of.
We are also promoting the magazine with a half-waterfall half way down the women’s aisle.
The new owners of Darrell Lea have connected with their pet-food roots and struck a deal to supply IGA supermarkets with Darrell Lea product. This will challenge sales in the existing network of independent retailers. It also sets the brand as a supermarket consumer brand more so than the premium brand of yesteryear.
I’d expect more newsagents to pull out of the product and look for premium confectionery products elsewhere.
For more than ten years newsagent associations fought each other, often viciously, over the issue of unity of representation. There was a sigh of relief when unity was announced by the various associations.
It appears to me that the announced unity is not the unity newsagents wanted.
Today, newsagents face the most significant national issue on which retail newsagents and distribution newsagents should be represented by a single national voice. Instead, the major state associations are running the issue with different messages and via different means.
This is a missed opportunity for newsagents.
Whereas in the past newspaper contract matters were state-based, as that is how publishers handled them, today, they are national – the publishers have made them so.
Look at NANA, VANA and the QNF: they are each running T2020 as a state issue. T2020 is national. It should be run nationally for newsagents by the ANF. These state associations ought to have asked the ANF to run it months ago and they ought to have resourced the ANF to run it.
The best association is one that represents its members on issues of policy and direction. Running off at a tangent investing in and setting up businesses and funding legal fights has been shown for many years to be a waste of association resources.
If the fat were cut from the various newsagent associations and a single national body established to be a true association, I am sure more newsagents would engage. The conflicting agendas between the state associations misrepresent the needs of today’s newsagents.
Our channel is over-governed for its size. Unless it establishes more efficient, modern-day and genuinely unified representation, the various voices of the various associations will continue to be ineffective for the newsagents they claim to represent.
The announcements of unity from a year or so ago appear to have been hollow words. When newsagents need consistent national representation, too much time and money is being spent on local approaches.
The Girlfriend Twitter feed is going nuts this morning for the first instalment of the five part One Direction series from Pacific Magazines’ Girlfriend today.
Newsagents need to make the most of this. Get the magazine in prime position. This is more important than ever as the demographic this title appeals to are not usual newsagency shoppers. You need to attract them from outside your shop.
I’d also have the title with weeklies as mums will know if their kids are into 1D. This series is an excellent opportunity for all of us to grab incremental magazine business.
Halloween is still five weeks away and sales are well ahead of this time last year.
We are chasing a minimum of 25% year on year growth from the season this year. We set goals for every season.
There is something to be said for going out early with a season, especially one that many other retailers usually come late to.
Halloween is fun and easy. At this time in the season most purchases are impulse – a welcome addition to the basket.
I know of some newsagents who don’t like the season, saying it’s American (which it’s not) and that it won;t work (it usually does). This is a fun season, perfect for warming he business up in the run home to Christmas.
Newspaper carriers in the US, delivery drivers in Australia (paperboys & girls in some parts of the country), have their day on October 13. It will International newspaper carrier day as designated by the Newspaper Association of America.
It is smart of newspaper publishers to recognise those so responsible fort getting their product delivered to their customers. We could use something like this in Australia but recognising carriers and retail specialists in awards run and judged by the publishers.
Check out the table at the entrance to a jeweller business I saw in the US recently. Free coffee for anyone who wants one.
Since it’s just inside the lease line there is no grief form the landlord.
It’s a nice touch, giving shoppers a message that this business is thinking abut them. Indeed, it was the only jewellery business, out of four in this mall, with free coffee on offer.
I know newsagents who do this with soup in the winter and iced water in summer. I like the idea and the customer service difference it represents. It’s something corporate stores struggle with getting right.
Writing in The Guardian, David Leigh contemplates about the future of newspapers: A £2-a-month levy on broadband could save our newspapers.
Okay, maybe such a levy could save newspapers. Why knows? If governments go down that route then why not a levy to save the local shops that nutture and promote local character. And why not a levy to save the penny farthing? Yes, absurd … I know.
What is happening to mainstream media businesses is business. No protection ought to be sought or provided. Businesses will prosper or fail based on what they deliver to their customers. This is as it should be.
It is frustrating enough that the federal government has provided TV networks with financial aid for dealing with the switch to digital. Small businesses are not assisted in coming with change to the same degree.
No, I hope that any proposal to strike a levy to save any business is quickly dismissed.
The media section in The Australian yesterday reported that Google is set to launch an online magazine store in Australia from which digital magazine subscriptions will be sold. The report notes that several publishing sources have confirmed the imminent launch.
While I am not happy about such a move I understand it. Google is on a mission as are magazine publishers. Their goals meet beautifully on this. I’d pursue Google if I were a magazine publisher.
This reported move is another reminder to newsagents that we, each of us, has to set our own course for the future, a course over which we have more control than he have had over our past.
Fifty Shades of Grey is the bestselling book ever in Britain. Other books in the series, Fifty Shades Darker and Fifty Shades Freed are also bestsellers, selling millions of copies.
I’d be curious to know whether any newsagents have been selling the books or any products that leverage interest in the books.
Massive trends like this are ideal for newsagents. Look at our Harry Potter related products, Twilight products and other wonderful movie and book franchises. we are made for leveraging entertainment franchises – yes, even he raunchy subject matter of the Fifty Shades series.
