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

Another reason to promote Peppa Pig

peppashowThe live Peppa Pig show touring Australia is generating excellent interest and giving us plenty of opportunities for selling the Hallmark Peppa Pig cards and the Peppa Pig licenced gifts, plush and other products we have access to.

This is a mega brand that fits nicely within newsagency businesses. It’s important we are aware of the touring schedule for the show as this will attract media attention and this is what we can leverage into sales across our counter – if we promote the Peppa Pig brand appropriately in-store.

Peppa Pig is an excellent example of the importance of being on the front foot – getting out there and telling our customers and prospective customers in our catchment area that we are their local Peppa Pig outlet.

Footnote: make sure Peppa Pig related magazines are part of your Peppa Pig story.

2 likes
Newsagency management

Delayed billing does not play in newsagent magazine early return decisions

delaybill72.62% of newsagents participating in the early returns survey on the weekend have indicated that delayed billing does not impact early returns decisions.

This will shock some magazine publishers.

I know of publishers who have been encouraged to introduce delayed billing to reduce early returns.

Are you listening publishers? I sincerely hope so. I created this survey for you – to let you hear what newsagents think.

Delayed billing is administratively frustrating and while it’s nice to not have to worry about payment, it does not address the challenges of space and labour allocation to support a title.

The best way for a publisher to ensure a title remains on the shelf is for them to pay us a fair price for the use of our space.

48.81% of respondents say they early return a title because they do not have space to this play it.

The newsagency channel is the only channel selling magazines in Australia where product is sent without regard to the space available for displaying products. Our treatment in this regard disadvantages newsagents and provides our competitors with a competitive advantage.

Magazine publishers ought to study the survey results as should those working for magazine distributors. The results reflect a brokenness that must be fixed if newsagents are to stop retreating from engagement with magazines.

It is in the hands of magazine publishers and magazine distributors to fix this. I am worried that they will realise this too late to save magazines in the newsagency channel.

You can see the survey responses here.

Tomorrow, I will share newsagent responses to my last question:What can publishers and or distributors to do to stop you early returning?

9 likes
magazine distribution

Smart connection with the shopper

smartretailI love this sign I saw in a newsagency earlier this week with umbrellas and gumboots as it is smarter and smoother than a traditional retail sign that says buy me. This is not the type of sign I’d usually see in a newsagency for umbrellas. The products themselves are different too – more higher end, like fashion. Inspirational!

3 likes
Tactical display

Poor label placement can hinder magazine sales

magsbadlabelI was helping a newsagent to boost magazine sales recently and trained them on label placement. They were putting labels on titles they did not need to label and they were placing the labels without care. Placing a label over the title masthead – as in the example in the photo – can make it hard for a shopper to understand the title. What are rées anyway?

1 likes
magazines

What do you think of How Busy Women Get Rich?

richwomenI’d love to hear what newsagents think about How Busy Women Get Rich a new title released this week by Bauer Media. I find the title jarring but I am not the customer. Despite what I think we have the title placed with business as well as with women’s titles. We will give it a couple of weeks to find customers.

2 likes
magazines

Vale, Robin Williams

Today is one of those days when customers will talk a bit longer at the newsagency counter following news of the tragic death of Robin Williams. Everyone has a movie, a comedy routine or some other happy memory of the genius of Robin Williams. Dead Poets Society, Good Will Hunting, Good Morning Vietnam, Mrs Doubtfire – the list of mesmerising performances is long.

I wish I was at the shop today the shared memories would be heartwarming.

11 likes
Newsagency management

Newsagency magazine early returns survey results

earlyreturns168 responses to my magazine rely returns survey provide a valuable  insight into newsagent thinking on early magazine returns.

167 of the 168 respondents undertake early returns. 100 say they return the day magazines come in and 67 say they early return before the end of the month but not the day they come in.

What is most telling is the reasons newsagents indicate for engaging in early returns. 91.67% of newsagents say they are sent too much stock. This is a damning stat. Every copy of every magazine oversupplied has a cost in space, labour and opportunity to newsagents.

48.81% of respondents say they early return a title because they do not have space to this play it.

The newsagency channel is the only channel selling magazines in Australia where product is sent without regard to the space available for displaying products. Our treatment in this regard disadvantages newsagents and provides our competitors with a competitive advantage.

Magazine publishers ought to study the survey results as should those working for magazine distributors. The results reflect a brokenness that must be fixed if newsagents are to stop retreating from engagement with magazines.

It is in the hands of magazine publishers and magazine distributors to fix this. I am worried that they will realise this too late to save magazines in the newsagency channel.

You can see the survey responses here.

Tomorrow, I’ll look in some detail at the issue of delayed billing covered in the survey and Wednesday I will share newsagent responses to my last question: What can publishers and or distributors to do to stop you early returning?

10 likes
Ethics

ACCC has time for dating scams but not newsagents

My experience over the years with the ACCC is that they care less about situations that disadvantage small business newsagents and their customers. Despite the ACCC playing a role in the deregulation of print media distribution in Australia, they have been hands off in investigating complaints of anti-competitive of supermarkets and others compared to small business newsagents.

The ACCC does care about dating though if news reports over the last day are accurate. It appears they are investing time and money in helping Australians to avoid dating scams.

Newsagents are disadvantaged in the current magazine distribution model. This benefits the supermarket duopoly and that, in turn, dilutes competition.

The ACCC and those it reports to care less.

8 likes
magazine distribution

OzLotteries promoting Powerball $50M

po50milOzLotteries is actively promoting the Powerball $50 million jackpot with emails to people on their database. I’m on their database and don’t recall other recent emails from them as the Powerball jackpots grew. I wonder if a $50M jackpot is the trigger for their marketing to kick in.

1 likes
Lotteries

News Corp. data screw up for Attenborough DVD

There is a problem with some data sent by News Corp to some newsagents for the Attenborough DVD promotion. Here it is the end of Monday and the company is yet to make a statement. In the meantime newsagency software companies and others have spent too much time today dealing with the problem created by News – with no compensation.

News has failed. It needs to own the situation, apologise and lay out a rectification path. That’s not too much to ask.

4 likes
Newspapers

First newsagency to offer PayPal payment method

knox-paypalWe are excited to be the first newsagency in Australia to offer PayPal as a fully integrated payment method.

Using their new App, PayPal customers will be attracted to the business through the app – this is a key element of PayPal engagement – promoting your business.

The PayPal integration shows how professional app / POS software integrations should be done (note Bauer).

There will be a more formal launch once we’re through this live testing phase. PayPal has some exciting ideas for promoting the business.

14 likes
marketing

Fuel Magazine supports newsagents & we should support it

fuelmagThe publisher of Fuel Magazine hit Twitter last week in support of newsagents as the go to retailers for the specialist automotive culture title. I thanked them for their support. They are keen to see more newsagents actively get behind the Aussie title – and Fuel Magazine is the real deal when it comes to being Australian. Check out this from their website:

Fuel Magazine® is a quarterly publication focused on automotive culture, the people who live it, and the machines that they build. Each issue is over 140 pages long, is printed using high quality stocks and binding right here in locally in Melbourne, Australia.

Using good photography, writing and design presentation, Fuel Magazine® is available through our online shop, nationally via the Australian newsagency network, or through our domestic and international independent resellers.

This is a title we should all get behind.

6 likes
magazines

Early start to Father’s Day

cardsfdaystartFather’s Day cards have started selling and we are still a month away from the day. While not massive sales, early sales are enough to warrant our initial placement at the front of the newsagency. The photo shows not even a third of what we will have out by the time we are in full swing with the season. We have this stand on the lease line, facing into the mall.

1 likes
Greeting Cards

Men’s Fitness cover-up

mensfwhatI was disappointed to see the masthead of the latest Men’s Fitness magazine covered with a stuck-on ad for Anytime Fitness. With the Men’s Health and Men’s Fitness mastheads looking similar – red on white – I’d have avoided covering up a key differentiator – the word Fitness. The offer itself is not worth trashing your brand for.

1 likes
magazines

Entertainment for Rupertphiles

rupertIf you’re Sydney based and a follower of Rupert Murdoch’s businesses and career you may want to see the David Williamson play Rupert. It’s on at the Theatre Royal in the city from late November. Rupert received good reviews when it first opened last year. Maybe we could rustle up a newsagent theatre night?

2 likes
Newspapers

Sunday newsagency marketing tip: embrace local artists

This is a marketing tip for a high street newsagency, a business with a footpath in front. Invite a local artist or local artists to create a locally themed footpath mural.

Plan in advance: get Council permission, send out flyers and turn the creation of the meal into an event. If getting an artist is a challenge, try the local school.

The goal is to create activity in front of your shop, show your sport for local artists and have fun. It makes your newsagent relevant to those who care about the local community.

The local newspaper and radio station should pick up on the event, especially with the art being of a local feature or event.

I am not suggesting you try and fur this into a commercial event as that should happen naturally with traffic generated. Sometimes, the most commercially effective events are those you do not set out to be commercial events.

4 likes
marketing

Sunday newsagency management tip: manage your back room

The back room of a modern newsagency is not an ideal place of work. It’s away from the heart of the business, the shop floor.

Smart newsagents have reduced their use of a back room, transferring previous back room work to the shop floor and the shop counter, they have adjusted their buying so that stock needed arrives just in time to go straight onto the shop floor.

Using a back room less will often reduce the labour cost in the business and this is where real savings can be achieved. In your average newsagency business, an hour of adult rostered time saved is the same as selling $92.00 worth of magazines or $46.00 worth of gifts.

An better value of reducing back room focused work could be to not reduce rostered hours and instead focus the saved time on the shop floor. Good retail staff on the shop floor will drive sales and this is even more money in there bank.

Merely having a back room where work is done is an invitation to you and your employees to not be doing the one thing that makes the business most of its money – selling.

Use your back room as little as possible – if at all.

4 likes
Management tip

The front of the newsagency this weekend

fos-aug09This photo shows half of the front of the newsagents as it is set for this weekend. On the left we have part of our Father’s day card range for early shoppers, next is sand that attracts kids and parents, next is the new line of scarves that started selling when we put them out Friday, next is beanie Boos that attract young girls and finally is a display of Pacific Magazines titles promoting the $5000 shopping spree competition.

It’s a little cramped but it is working, delivering good sales off each of the units yesterday and attracting terrific traffic from the mall into the newsagency during the course of the day.

Setting the front of the newsagency shop needs to be seen as a management responsibility and a key marketing activity.

1 likes
Newsagency management

How one customer paid $2.00 for Yours magazine

A customer today told me that we charge too much for Yours and that they just paid $2. They bought the Australian Women’s Weekly and Yours at a Coles Express and got Yours for $2.00. They went back later and returned AWW using the refund to buy another title they actually wanted – meaning they got Yours for $2.00. They left reminding me that we charge too much for Yours. Thanks for that Coles & Bauer.

7 likes
magazines

Terrific Bauer promotion exclusive to Woolworths

wwbauerpromoBauer Media is running another exclusive promotion in Woolworths. Over 28 days they are giving away a 28 Samsung TVs, one a day for the competition running period.

The total prize pool as noted in the rules is $83,972.00.

This is a lucrative competition to run in a single retail channel. Woolworths would have to be happy with the value it pitches to their customers.

3 likes
magazines
Trending Articles

Fairfax changes approach to TV Guide, disrespects newsagents

Published on April 20, 2011

What do you think of the Powerball changes?

Published on February 16, 2018

IPS releases new magazine contracts

Published on June 21, 2011