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

Author: Mark Fletcher

Stolen magazines on the streets for $2

Check out the magazines I saw available for $2 each out the front of a business branding itself as a newsagent ten days ago. Click on the image to see the detail.

These are magazines that should have been returned.  My suspicion is that they are from a retailer not required to physically return stock in order to claim return credits. I am told that some major supermarkets are not required to return some magazine stock.

A staff member could process the returns and then remove (steal) the stock from the business for (illegal) on-sale rather than trashing it as would be required.

Too many publishers are represented on this table for the supply of these titles to have been arranged through them. The price of $2 is too low and they would not want their brands treated in this way. This looks like stolen property to me.

None of the magazines has a price sticker or barcode label from the retailer, not even any residue of such labels. This suggests that the stock is from a retailer who would not price or label their stock.

The only way this promotion makes sense is that the magazines are stolen as described above. The retailer offering the stock today would have to know this given that they carry full price magazines inside their shop and would therefore understand the supply chain for magazine product.

I hope that magazine distributors run spot audits of retailers permitted to claim returns without actually returning the stock.  Given what I have seen recently and earlier this year I have my doubts.

Footnote – this business is not a newsagency business. It is a convenience store with the shingle newsagent above the door. The business does not have direct supply of magazines.

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magazine distribution

Promoting iPhone and tech magazines with weeklies

Since late last week we have been promoting tech magazines with weekly titles. I selected a range of titles I felt would appeal to the weekly magazine shopper.

In four days we have seen some product sold from here. I suspect that these purchases have been on impulse and because of the positioning of these titles away from their usual location.

If you look inside each of these magazines you will see that they are aimed at everyday readers and not geeks. This is why promoting them outside the usual geek location is important for us.

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magazines

Promoting InStyle

We are promoting the latest issue of InStyle magazine with a half waterfall display. The goal is to show off the Lancome Juicy Tubes gift with the title.

We appear to be in the middle of magazine gift season with many titles featuring gifts packed with the titles.

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magazines

Shoppers optimistic for Christmas

We are experiencing the strongest start to Christmas sales in years. Shoppers we talk with are optimistic. Gone are concerns of recent years about what may be around the corner. While what we hear on the shop floor is no scientific survey, the optimism is obvious and delivering good early Christmas sales.

Card sales are good but its gifts that are selling very well. So well, in fact, that we are ordering more stock.

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Gifts

Oversupply of Farms & Farm Machinery magazine hurts newsagents

Check out twelve issues worth of supply and return data for Farms & Farm Machinery for a newsagency. On average, one copy is sold in this store. The average supply from Network Services is three copies – recently bumped supply to four copies. Click on the image for detail.

Okay I am only complaining about one too many copies, maybe two. It is oversupply nevertheless. This from a magazine distributor known for engaging in bullying of newsagents over account payment yet accepting no responsibility for creating account challenges through oversupply such as for Farms & Farm Machinery for this newsagency.

If Network services was fair in its supply to this newsagency and newsagents more widely, it would not increase supply until there was evidence of sales being lost due to lack of stock in-store. This would require an analysis of sales data.

If a store sells out in, say, week three of the on-sale and there is no evidence of a sale over the last year in week four for weeks when stock was available then I’d say there is no justification for a supply increase. If, on the other hand, there is evidence of a sale in week four then it would be reasonable to increase supply.

It is unfair for network to demand that we are responsible for our indebtedness to them when they refuse to give us reasonable levers with which to control our level of indebtedness. Even transparency would help – like a discussion around allocation algorithms.

Newsagents who complain to Network about oversupply are met with – it was an allocations error or I can’t explain it or the business rules indicate you need more stock.

In this case of Farms & Farm Machinery, the company’s processes have failed the newsagent. They have resulted in more stock than is necessary being sent. Supply for this store should be at no more than two copies. Sending the extra stock lumbers the newsagent with unnecessary costs.

Magazine publishers using network should remember this scenario when wondering why newsagents early return their stock. It is this creeping oversupply that angers newsagents and gets them striking out.

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magazine distribution

Promoting AWW Christmas cookbooks

We have placed all four AWW branded Christmas cookbooks together in pursuit of multiple purchases. These are adjacent to the counter, passed by most shippers as they head to the counter. While we do have stock with our cookbooks, this counter position is the most important one.

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magazines

New Idea wins the diet stakes

New Idea and Woman’s Day have a similar diet pitch cover story this week. New Idea wins thanks to the free diet booklet on the cover and the additional collateral provided to us to help draw more attention to the pitch. A shopper looking to purchase one of the two titles this week is more likely to go for New Idea on the basis of the pitch. Pacific does these header cards well, designing them with a dual purpose.

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magazines

Promoting Hot Boys of Music

We are promoting Hot Boys of Music with our One Direction part serves as well as with teen magazines and music magazines. I do think, however, that it’s the placement at the front of the shop with the One Direction titles that will work best for us. We are promoting the title with a range of social media activity. This should work given that we’re well known in the target marketplace.

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magazines

A lesson in media disruption

Click on the image to see the detail of a Tweet sent early today by @jadeleanneNDUBZ to her 1,531 Twitter followers. In the image you will also see a text from her dad and her response to that text. Her dad sent her a text about Justin Bieber and Selena Gomez splitting. Her response about this being a headline in a newspaper is gold for those watching the impact of social media on old media news channels.

The text messages and tweet reminded me of why we are able to sell magazines with Bieber and One Direction featuring in them. They are purchased more as collector items and not as news as such.

It is not just this generation getting news from Twitter and other platforms. My own newspaper interaction has diminished significantly due to Twitter. It’s short-form publishing platform works well in a time-poor world. It’s instant publishing gives me access to news sooner.

Years ago, if we sold out of newspapers by lunchtime on a Saturday there were several means by which we could get replacement stock. We would pursue these because of the role newspapers played in the traditional retail newsagency business.

Today, we are out by noon 50% of the time and no longer chase replacement product because the supply model seen non newsagency outlets supplied to not sell out and because the newspaper is not as important as it used to be. When I told a shopper on the weekend that we were out of The Age they said – it’s old news anyway. Seriously, that’s what they said.

All of this is as it should be – the world evolving, embracing new technology. Our challenge as newsagents is to be retailers focused on the future, giving less attention to the past.

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Media disruption

Retail newsagency marketing tip: make shopper traffic work for you

Most newsagencies have excellent foot traffic. Challenges we read about in the comments on this blog and at newsagent meetings are not related to traffic. Margin is what many complain about. Slim margin on lottery, circulation, mobile phone and some other products is what I hear complained about often.

The question we have to ask ourselves is are we leveraging our excellent current traffic to build a better future margin dollars story?

Too often we look at a newspaper sale or a magazine sale or a lottery ticket sale in isolation.

What if the newspaper sale today led to a greeting card sale tomorrow? The newspaper sale becomes more valuable, it delivers to us better margin dollars than the newspaper sale itself. This is what our competitors are doing. While they chase today’s sale, manyn of our competitors work hard to get that person back to bring more value to the business.

What are you doing, consistently, to bring newspaper, magazine, lottery, mobile phone recharge, transport ticket and other slim margin business back into your shop to purchase other products? Consistency is key here – having a structured approach that every team member engages in.

Here are some ways we can do this: with loyalty cards like the magazine club card or the greeting card loyalty card or a business wide points based loyalty program or coupons that are dated to get people back within a certain time. Whatever you go for you need to ensure it is pitched across the counter regularly to invite and entice shoppers back sooner. The indirect message is that you are asking for their loyalty.

If you do nothing to entice shoppers back then you will not achieve the maximum value from the traffic you have today.

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marketing tip

Retail newsagency management tip: set an owner’s sales target

While many newsagency business owners work the shop floor, many do not … not as a sales person that is. My management tip suggestion is that owners set themselves a sales target for each hour on the shop floor.

The target should reflect the value of items shoppers purchase based on your work on the shop floor. These will usually be incremental purchases, items they might not have bought had it not been for your shop floor work.

Working to a target will … show how hard or easy this is, help you measure your own effectiveness, get you looking at your shop floor differently and maybe fines your approach in managing your own staff.  Take it seriously. Let your team know what you are doing and why. Share with them the sales target you have set for yourself.

This suggestion came about because of my own experience on the shop floor yesterday.

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Management tip

Placing It Girl to sell

We have shifted half our stock of It Girl from the usual location to our front of store One Direction display to make the most of the One Direction cover on the magazine. we placed it next to the One Direction one shot which has been selling very well for us. The extra space cost us nothing and we’re certain to pick up some sales as a result.

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magazines

Word of mouth in the Twitter age

Check out the tweet from a One Direction fan who was thrilled to see “the boys” on magazine covers. I mention it today as a reminder that in this twitter world, word of mouth (via tweets) spread faster and wider. It’s also a reminder that we can connect to this world and the fan base of brands and music groups through careful tweets of our own. It starts with each of us having a presence of Twitter. Sadly, our channel is poorly represented.

I appreciate time is a challenge for newsagents. Maybe we are spending too long on old processes and opportunities and not enough on the new. The world has changed.

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Social Media

Promoting the Home and Away 25th anniversary special

We are promoting the Home and Away 25th anniversary special at the counter as well as with weekly magazines. It’s working well in each location with more sales coming from the placement with weeklies.

Next week we are planning a bold in-store display having freed up some space to push harder – to chase more sales.

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magazines

Promoting House and Garden

We are making the most of the free wrapping paper offer with the latest issue of House and Garden magazine. Better Homes and Gardens has done this for years with terrific success. It’s a good practical gift at this time of the year and ideal with this type of magazine.

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magazines

Famous grows in weekly magazine sales audit

Famous delivered 2.5% year on year growth in the July-September audit results just out. Grazia dropped 10%, Woman’s Day 6%, New Idea 1% and Take 5 and That’s Life 10% each. Check out B&T for more details. I suspect we will se one or two more titles go the way of Australian Good Food shortly as sales volumes are unsustainable.

What we need to take away is the growth for Famous. We should check our sales and see if we are benefiting from this. It’s an opportunity.

Also, benchmark your sales for Woman’s Day and New Idea and see if your figures match the audit. As B&T notes, the recent New Idea campaign and refresh of the product are paying off.

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magazines

Shocking audit for Fairfax newspapers

The July – September sales audit results are challenging across the board for newspapers but devastating for Fairfax where The Age lost 16.9% Monday to Friday and The Sydney Morning Herald lost 15.1% Monday to Friday. Read the details at B&T. With the AFR down to 68,000 copies a day you have to wonder about when they will switch to digital.

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Media disruption

The Christmas hero product

I love it when we can get a product exclusively for a major season like Christmas and when the product is easily displayed on the shop floor. We have achieved this with the world’s only mains pressure water canon.

We have had the water canon out for only a few days and we’re certain we will sell out. Shopper interaction is excellent – having the product on display is vital as they can feel for themselves the quality and understand the value.

We aim for one or two hero products for every season, products that define and differentiate our offer, to show us off to our shoppers as unique and to pitch value.

We are promoting the water canon through flyers as well as using social media.

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Gifts

Promoting the charity connection

We have created our own marketing collateral for promoting the charities supported by our boxed Christmas card range this year. These posters sit atop our stacks of boxed Christmas cards and the show off the logos of the charities supported by the cards we carry.

We have found over the years that the charity connection for boxed cards has grown in importance. hence our decision to present a very clear message on the help our customer provide when they purchase their boxed Christmas cards from us.

Promoting the charity connection in this way shines a light on a point of difference for us.

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Greeting Cards

Bauer to close Australian Good Food

Bauer announced yesterday that they will close Australian Good Food magazine. That’s two food magazines gone in a short time. I don’t think it’s reflective of a problem for the segment. rather, these titles were not attractive shoppers because they did not stand out.

The last issue of Australian Good Food will be the December/January issue.

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magazines
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