Magazine publishers need to stop using newsagents as warehouses
With the cost of retail space increasing and magazine cover prices not keeping up with this and other costs of business, it’s only natural that newsagents look at operating costs. One cost we could do without is that of storing magazines with a greater than 30 day on-sale period. Once you consider the cost of storing a long shelf life title until their either sell or are returned it is often loss making.
Delayed billing does not address this issue. The only solution is replenishment drops through the on-sale based on sales.
While using newsagency businesses as warehouses works for the publisher, it no longer works for newsagents. The numbers have changed in recent years, our costs have risen far more significantly than margin dollars for some of these titles we are asked to warehouse. This is especially true those in shopping centres with higher occupancy costs and especially for titles where the cover price has not kept up with the CPI and increases in our operating costs.
