A blog on issues affecting Australia's newsagents, media and small business generally. More ...

Author: Mark Fletcher

Excellent advice for retailers (and newsagents) in assessment of Bauer shutting magazine titles

Valerie Khoo has contributed an excellent piece at SMH.COM.AU on a lesson for all small business owners – retailers and newsagents – in the recent moved by Bauer to shut magazine titles. I’d encourage everyone to read this article. Regulars here will remember I’ve written about similar things myself.

We all need to clean our own houses as Bauer is doing and we need to try and do this with the eyes of a new owner. That’s the essence of Valerie’s article.

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Newsagency management

QNF set to merge with ANF

Nine years after it was first proposed by the ANF, the QNF has today announced the calling of a Special General Meeting to vote on the merging of the QNF with the ANF, as a division of the national association.

This is good move, one Victoria and NSW/ACT should follow. Newsagents spend too much money on disconnected and conflicted representation.

Why didn’t this happen nine years ago?  Egos got in the way.

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Newsagent representation

Cool stationery vital to getting newsagents back in the stationery game

As Smiggle and Typo stores in Australia show, funky sells, cheap funky especially. For these items, price and funkiness trump quality. The success of Smiggle and Typo attest to that. They have taken plenty of our social stationery sales.

Yesterday I got to see several stationery businesses and saw some funky stationery lines creeping into the traditional stationery offering.

The photo shows a notepad and pen set I saw at a Staples store in Boston. Very cool indeed. And selling quickly!

We need to be in the space and be in it well. Not so much Smiggle as they own young kids. We need to be in this funky stationery space for older shoppers – with stationery people will purchase on impulse and often as a gift … like this cake-slice-like notepad and pen set.

Suppliers who help newsagents get into this part gift part stationery part fashion space should expect to do good business with our channel.

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Newsagency opportunities

Opportunities for newsagents in latest Australian Traveller magazine

Newsagents should check out the locations covered in the latest issue of Australian Traveller magazine.  The feature, 100 Incredible Travel Secrets of Australia, is already receiving excellent media coverage.

Read the Checklist and see if somewhere near you is listed. This list has local promotion opportunities as well as other opportunities. EG Kyneton is featured – newsagencies nearby should promote this widely.

Australian Traveller continues to sell well. For us, it’s our best performing travel title. We place it with travel titles and with women’s weeklies. Co-location is essential if you want to achieve the best sales possible.

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magazines

Is the closure of the Fairfax Monday to Friday newspapers inevitable?

Check out this paragraph from Stephen Bartholomeusz’s piece about the latest restructure at newspaper publisher Fairfax:

The next big decision will come when the printing of the metros moves to the regional presses and the Chullora and Tullamarine plants are shut down and sold. At that point Hywood will have to confront the decision as to whether to continue printing the loss-making Monday-to-Friday papers or to shut them down and move to a digital-only presence outside the weekends. It appears a forgone, albeit very painful, conclusion.

The current daily sales of the Fairfax dailies is lower than US titles that have either gone 100% digital or stopped printing on some days.

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Media disruption

Brilliant Easter Bonnet Parade

I spent hours roaming the Easter Bonnet Parade on Fifth Avenue on Sunday. It was a treat to see amazing creativity at work. Just about all the Bonnets were home made using materials many of us sell in our newsagencies. It was inspiring to see what people created.

The parade is no real parade in that’s it’s not an organised march. People mingled and posed for photos … very un-New York … people relaxed and enjoying strolling the streets.

It was inspiring – to work on something like with local newsagents at the heart of promoting it. I know some do this very well already. But why not more? It’s something we could own for the community to enjoy.

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Fun

Too many free magazines will hurt magazine sales

I am concerned at what feels like a trend more magazines in Australia being given away as gifts and add-ons to the purchase of other items. Maybe it’s just me but it feels like I am seeing more single issues and mini free subscriptions being given with other purchases.

Publishers I speak with say they do this to get their title sampled by people bot currently purchasing the title. While this may be the case, I’d prefer to facilitate the sampling through a retail network that supports and benefits from the sale of magazines.

Publishers need to value their titles more. Give fewer copies away. Discount subscriptions less. Sell them through fewer retailers. Publishers of good content will find that shoppers seek them out. Magazines with less valued content will need to give copies away, discount subscriptions more and have them placed in more retail outlets.

I don’t want to see Australia go the way of the US where heavily discounted subscriptions and product tie-in deal account for a sizeable portion of circulation.

Some giveaways don’t make sense. This is particularly the case in the US. It cheapens the magazines.  I purchased a couple of tickets to a broadway show on Saturday and immediately after my credit card was processed, a screen popped up advising that I could select three titles and for each I would receive a three month trial subscription.

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magazines

Frustrated with the Street Machine Mystery Triple Pack

I have been contacted by several newsagents about the Street Machine Mystery Triple Pack – received from Bauer this week. Between them, they were unhappy that it is thick – more expensive to display, discounted – challenging the premium magazine offer and a mystery – likely to lead to being opened in-store.

This is the kind of package Bauer should ask newsagents if they want to carry it. It’s our retail space, our labour and our money for the stock at risk.  This mystery pack is outside the usual and therefore should be approached differently.

The Bauer (Network) accounts department has a reputation for being the toughest and rudest in the newsagency channel. I’d agree with that. Often, despite having a security bond covering debt, they chase newsagents aggressively – hurting people who felt helpless in controlling magazine supply.  It is unfair, in my view, that they do not provide newsagents with reasonable mechanisms with which to better manage our level of indebtedness, better controls for stopping a title like Street Machine Mystery Triple Pack before it is sent to us.

Several publishers have had out of the ordinary packs, titles and offers over the last few months that they have put to newsagents on an opt-in basis. This is what I prefer for such opportunities.

To the Bauer folks saying that I have a vendetta against them, I don’t. I had no control over the allocation of this title to newsagents. This post has been written on behalf of newsagents who wanted the issue aired.

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magazines

Bauer to close Madison

Bauer announced yesterday that it would close Madison magazine. This is not unexpected because of the performance of the title. Nor is it unexpected in terms of Bauer cleaning the ACP house. I expect that once they are done shutting and adjusting titles we will start reading about launches.

I hope that Bauer treats newsagents reasonably with Madison supply in the lead up to closure.  I.E. not like Grazia.

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magazines

I hope mX never turns into this

I got to check out a copy of metro, the free newspaper in New York yesterday. It’s a good newspaper. For tabloid readers there’s not much extra in the newspapers you have to pay for. metro is significantly better the mX in the various Australian capitals. While it’s very much an advertising-first platform, the news coverage is more broad, more appealing than what we’ve got in mX.

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Newspapers

Newsagency of the Future series for 2013 announced

I have finalised details for a capital city series of new Newsagency of the Future workshops.

Presenting fresh content with a fresh 2013 perspective, this two hour workshop will present a roadmap for those who want a roadmap, insights for those who want insights and hope for those seeking hope for the future of the newsagency business.

Much has changed in the last year. T2020, retail trends, the economy, newsagency sales, what we sell, how some suppliers treat us. Now more than at any time in our history, the future of our individual businesses is up to us.

I’ll talk specifically about ho to move your business from average GP (28% to 32%) to 50% (and more) GP and why this is essential.

Anyone is welcome to attend a Newsagency of the Future workshop – newsagents, suppliers and others.  You can book booking form or by booking online.

Each workshop is free and will run for around two hours.

Venues will be finalised in the next week. They will be centrally located and should have access to parking.

I will also be organising dates for Hobart, Newcastle, FNQ (either Townsville or Cairns), Albury, Canberra and the Gold Coast.

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Newsagency management

The things newsagents sell

I was in a newsagency a few months ago that was selling a poll for poll-dancing. My sexy little poll was not something I’d ever seen in a newsagency before. My first reaction was surprise.  Then, I thought why not? It fits with some products we sell already – kind of at least. Also, it lends itself to expanding into other areas like costumes. Yeah, why not sell a poll for poll dancing.

I bet across our channel, in newsagencies, we have products other newsagents would be surprised to sell.

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Gifts

Pot, kettle SMH

I am in the US and have been impressed with mainstream media handling of the horrific broken leg suffered by Kevin Ware on the basketball court on Sunday. The Sydney Morning Herald went to Twitter to note that the gruesome injury was all over social media. They should have checked their own site. The Age website had the video. Meanwhile, most mainstream media outlets here in the US did not show the injury. Instead, they reported the shock and seriousness of the injury by showing the reaction of ware’s teammates.

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New media

Newsagents cut rostered hours in response to penalty rates

In the survey I ran over the weekend, 75% of newsagents responding indicated that they cut paid rostered hours on Sunday given the higher than usual labour cost for the day.  This is an example of penalty rates working against employees.  I expect that many casual newsagent employees would have been happy with Sunday rates on Sunday.  120 newsagents responded to the survey.

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Newsagency management

100,000 create new magazines in days of new Flipboard feature

On Tuesday last week, Flipboard launched a feature allowing its users to create and share ‘magazines’. Within 24 hours of the launch, 100,000 new ,magazines were created. This speaks to the tremendous interest in self-curation. With the magazines being sharable it will be interesting to see the reach into the special interest space as this is where I’d expect many to focus. Talk about disruption.

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magazines

Weekend broadsheets from Fairfax a talking point

That the Fairfax newspapers The Age and The Sydney Morning Herald publish in broadsheet format on the weekends continues to be a talking point among shoppers. Most are confused about the different formats. The difference certainly gets people saying which format they prefer. Tabloid is the favourite from what people tell me.

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Newspapers

Gifts for older people attract shoppers

While we have done a lot of work over the last year on serving younger shoppers and those who buy for younger shoppers – as regulars here would know – we have not ignored our older shoppers.

The photo shows one range for an older demographic we have been enjoying success with. These drawer liners, room scents, wardrobe scents and other items are popular with shoppers buying for themselves and with others buying as gifts.

One shopper noticing our range commented to me she was surprised to find we had them. She’s given up finding drawer liners for her mother. Just discovering them in our shop gives us the sale of the liner and a card and, yes, a gift bag. She said she’d tell her friends. Nice.

Beyond serving the needs of an older demographic, this range is beautifully packaged. Placed together it tells a nice visual story. I also like that we can place the range without taking up too much space.

The customer’s comments were a reminder that we serve people of all ages and having products that serve a broad range of need (but still within your USP)  is best for business.

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Gifts

Sunday newsagency marketing tip: give away kisses with lottery tickets

Lottery products generate excellent traffic for many newsagencies yet many fail to turn the traffic into anything more than lottery product sales. Newsagents often blam their customers or the lottery products for not driving sales of other items.

Here’s an idea, a crazy idea, for getting the attention of lottery customers.

Get coupons printed that look like luscious red lips. Pay to have them die-cut. On the back have text like: five kisses gets you 25% off as many greeting cards as you want or five kisses gets you 33% of as much stationery as you want.

The key is to drive lottery shpper loyalty and to offer a reward for that. You achieve this with a simple, bright and unique coupon that is handed over with a fun pitch. Do all this and you’ll cut through to lottery shoppers who otherwise might never remember your shop.

Why a coupon in the shape of lips – kisses? Because it’s different. They’ll remember you for it.  This is not another coupon, it’s a kiss and who doesn’t like kisses?

Go on, have some fun and promote your business. Turn good traffic into more sales.

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marketing

Sunday newsagency management tip: automate stock reordering

I have been in a couple of newsagencies in the last week with product specific spinners filled with products they were not designed for. In each case, when I asked the owner they said they had not had time to do a reorder.  And, yes, in both cases, the stand had emptied quickly the first time around.

Good newsagency software makes it easy to reorder stock that sells. It does not take much time. Taking this approach is another way to reduce back office time spent running a newsagency.

Every day you are without fast-moving stock is another day of likely revenue loss and a hit to the profitability of the business.

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Management tip

Is Bauer oversupplying you with People?

On the back of a sell through of less than 50% for People magazine, the allocations system / allocations people at Bauer have given us a 25% increas in our supply. There is no reason for any increase in our sales data. Indeed, a decrease in supply is warranted. So, I ask the question of other newsagents: has your supply of People magazine been increased without justification?

I’d rather not write a blog post like this.  I’d rather not have the experience of a supply increase without justification in the sales data, sales data I provide to Bauer daily. I’d rather not have these mistakes occur – if they are mistakes. I’d rather not be put in a position where I think that publishers do this because they want newsagent cash to fund their businesses.

It’s not too much to ask to be supplied fairly based on the accurate data I provide.

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magazine distribution

How did Easter eggs do for you?

Easter eggs have not done great for us. We had an excellent range of eggs from Chocolatier and while they sold okay, we had to drop half of what we purchased to 50% late Thursday to move the stock. This is on the back of Easter card sales being up 20% YOY. Majors nearby were at 50% off and we had no choice if we wanted to get to the close of today with all stock gone. We’re on track to achieve that thankfully.  How did eggs do for you?

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confectionary

Politicians fail newsagents and all small business retailers

Julia Gillard says that only the Labor party will protect workers and keep in place penalty rates in place and protected with new laws.

Tony Abbott says the government should be replaced immediately yet he is offering no insight into how he would govern other than some slogans. He appears unwilling to pursue an equitable solution on the issue of penalty rates.

I am all for penalty rates where working on a particular day or at a particular time is a penalty. Like today, Good Friday – penalty rates should apply. Or even Easter Sunday.

Regular Saturdays and Sundays, they should attract no penalty rate.  This is what the politicians need to address. If Tony Abbott did address this he could expect more small business support. As it stands, there appears to be no real difference between the parties on what is a very important issue.

In the meantime, we are stuck with paying around $40 an hour for what is reasonably unskilled work at a time that suits those taking the weekend work.

My frustration is compounded by the knowledge that in the US, retailers pay under $10 an hour any day of the week. I don’t want to change the base to that level.  In fact, I don’t want to change the base at all.  What I do want is weekend penalty rates abolished. Such a move would be socially responsible.

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Ethics

Happy with March sales numbers

I have been going through our March to date numbers and comparing them with 2012 … cards, gifts, toys and plush account for 42% of sales and each is delivering well into double digit growth.  Plush will pass $6,000 in sales this month. Not bad for what is usually a quiet month, Easter notwithstanding.

Magazine sales are up 2%.

Overall, revenue is up 6% on the back of flat traffic but a deeper, more valuable basket.  the work we are doing reengineering our GP is delivering good results.

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Newsagency management
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