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

The cost of staff vs the cost of customer theft

Newsagents need to approach their roster with care since labour can account for between 30% and 50% of all gross profit earned in the business. Too often I see newsagents staff for comfort and out of fear of shopper theft and thereby cost the business more than if shopper theft had occured.

It’s a calculation you need to make on your situation. I’d say saving money off the roster will deliver a more beneficial outcome than paying more in labour and reducing theft – if your shop layout is good and if you have good theft management and mitigation processes in place.

This is on my mind today as I have been in a couple of newsagencies where the roster carried extra hours because of fear of theft. The roster cost several hundred dollars a week more than necessary in my view.

The other note I’d make is that the more employees the greater the risk of employee theft.

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Newsagency management

Newsagent put Western Union network at risk

Some newsagents have yet to ensure that their AUSTRAC documentation is up to date and to code. this has resulted in some locations being shut out of Western Union. I engaged the ANF for an update. here it is:

The Australian Government mandated re enrolment process which commenced in February 2012. The ANF WU Team have been working with the newsagency network to undertake this process; we have assisted a number of agents to complete the mandatory AUSTRAC re-enrolment documentation by the 31 October 2012 Government Imposed Deadline.

After only receiving 50% of the re enrolment forms by the original deadline the ANF sought an extension which was granted to all Western Union agents by AUSTRAC to 31 January 2013. We understand leading up to the January 2013 extended deadline that several hundred last minute re-enrolment packs from all Western Union network agents across the country including ANF agents were submitted to Western Union. These are now being processed. This has resulted in some agents being temporarily suspended due to the large volume. The ANF is in contact with western union numerous times daily chasing all relevant paper work to ensure our newsagents are back operating as soon as possible. The ANF is pushing for all newsagents to be fast tracked through this process.

We are re enforcing to Western Union that all of the goodwill you have created for the WU Brand is being eroded every day you’re not transacting. If you know of any agents that are experiencing difficulty please free to pass on my details.

Regards

Jerome Jones | Western Union – General Manager
Australian Newsagents’ Federation Ltd
Level 3, 33-35 Atchison Street, St Leonards NSW 2065
D 61 2 8425 9617 | F 61 2 8425 9699
jerome@anf.net.au | www.anf.net.au

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Newsagency management

Mollie Makes sells fast

We are tracking the sales of each issue of Mollie Makes, having discovered strong interest in the title in our store. Six copies sold in a week is good going for a special interest monthly. We will increase our order again to make sure that we leverage this title for all its worth. Word of mouth is solid, driving traffic from destination shoppers.  Nice.

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magazines

Promoting last issue of Burke’s Backyard

We have put the remaining stock of the last issue of Burke’s Backyard at the front, showing off the full cover to give it a chance to sell out. Note: we have more garden titles than those in the photo – this is the top tier of the section. We use this positioning for titles we feature. Better Homes and Gardens is the beacon product for then section.

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magazines

Celebrating Harpers Bazaar special issue

This aisle end display promoting the special 15th birthday edition of Harper’s Bazaar features the terrific collateral provided by Bauer for the occasion, collateral that works especially well on our fixtures.  I like that we have different material to work with here. PS. This is the issue I mentioned yesterday.

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magazines

Promoting Men’s Health

We’re promoting the latest issue of Men’s health magazine with this display facing into our men’s reading area – it’s a cave we have for guys so they can browse away from the main traffic of the business. We’ve kept Coach in the display as it’s a nice fit with Men’s Health.

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magazines

Confusion of Harpers Bazaar pricing

Our EDI data for Harper’s Bazaar today has it selling for $8.50 yet the stock we have is the $12.95 special issue – the magazine plus the 150 page runway report. We have asked network and Bauer what to do and as yet are to receive an answer. The note from Network with the magazine this morning was not as clear as it could have been.

Newsagents should check their stock and their computer system.

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magazine distribution

How we handled running out of The Age

We ran out of The Age (again!) before lunch on Saturday. Our supplying newsagent, also a retailer in the shopping centre, refused us extra stock so we purchased most of what they had left, at retail. They were itching for a fight but our team member making the purchase stood their ground.

Given either their inability to ensure they can meet demand or a failure of Fairfax to ensure reasonable supply to the area, we will continue to do this – buy stock from our supplying newsagent leaving them with nothing if necessary. Eventually the message will get through.

We refuse to be without newspapers at lunchtime on a busy Saturday.

Our preparedness to take this action shows that we see newspapers as playing an important role, still, in today’s retail newsagency publisher disinterest notwithstanding.

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Newsagent suppliers

Sheldon as a Valentine’s Day gift?

I noticed a couple of girls having fun with the cardboard cut out we had of Sheldon from Big Bang Theory on Saturday. There were taking photos. One of them said it would be the perfect Valentine’s Day gift. So I moved Sheldon from the rear of the magazine department to the front. Why not … it’s hard to fail when you listen to customers!

I deliberately placed the barcode on his forehead top show he’s for sale and it kind of fits with his character.

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magazines

Sunday newsagency management tip: compare your basket size

Commenters writing on my Do newsagencies have a future? post have been discussing average basket size with some publishing their number. Basket size can be measured in dollars or units. Good newsagency software reports this easily for you.  There is a considerable difference in basket size, beyond the size and performance of the business, depending on what you include. For example, lotteries, transport tickets and other volume agency lines can skew the results. This is why I recommend not including these high volume low margin items in such analysis.

I check the basket numbers in my own newsagencies every couple of weeks as basket depth – units and value – are a key indicator in what I’d call the small steps strategy for successful newsagency management. These are a range of small steps, measurement points, on which to focus to build a healthier business.

The current channel average basked size is 1.43 items with an average basket value of $3.65.

Easy access to good data is the most common reason I see for newsagency success or failure. There are no excuses. You don’t need to be IT savvy. You don’t need a lot of time. It’s not about business size. All you need is a desire to be successful in your newsagency. Do you check your basket data regularly?

Click on the image to see a a larger version year on year comparison of basket size (dollars and units) as well as a comparison of average item value and total items. This is the final analysis in what’s called the Monthly Sales Comparison report – my favourite report

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Management tip

Sunday newsagency marketing tip: plan for post Valentine’s Day

Depending on how Easter goes for you, the time between this Thursday and early May could be lean – unless you have plans.

After Valentine’s Day is done, what’s next for your newsagency? What do you have planned to bring in traffic and get them spending when they are there?

It’s vital we plan for these things so that we remain relevant between seasons. There is where pure gift shops are vulnerable. Many lurch from season to season, often barely existing in the valleys. This is when we can really hurt them given that we bring traffic in for a range of purposes beyond major seasons.

So, what is your post Valentine’s Day plan?

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marketing

What’s next to your newspapers?

Having your top selling newspapers in a shelf, display or some other stand by themselves is a missed opportunity for every newsagent. At the very least you need to place at least one magazine next to your top selling newspaper(s) always. We place two. Ever since we started this years ago it has worked a treat for us.

By far the best performing magazine next to newspapers is Better Homes and Gardens. This is especially true Thursdays through Sundays. back in the day we counted what we placed with newspapers, to gather data on what works best. hence our certainty that BHG is the best title here for us. For the entire first two weeks of the on-sale we have BHG between the Herald Sun and The Age. We often hve a second title – but that varies based on what we think will work, changing it at least weekly.

If you don’t have a magazine or two with newspapers at the moment, try it – you are certain to sell more copies of the magazines you place here.

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magazines

Latest US magazine circulation results not good for retail

The latest over the counter sales results of magazines in the US are not good for magazine publishers. Once you separate digital and subscription circulation out, you can see that what they call single copy sales are in deep decline for many titles.

Digital circulation more than doubled.  It’s the weekly gossip and entertainment titles that suffered steep declines in retail sales:

Some of the weakest numbers in the second half of 2012 belonged to celebrity weeklies.Life & Style saw its total circulation drop 18.4 percent, OK! Weekly fell 14.4 percent, and In Touch fell 14.3 percent. Star and Us Weekly did slightly better, with circulations declining 4.9 and 2.2 percent, respectively. And People, the category leader and typically its strongest, was the only magazine in the category to see its circulation rise, by nearly 2 percent, despite a 12.2 percent decline in newsstand sales.

I don’t know enough about People but maybe it’s focus is similar to Famous which performs against trend here in Australia.

Read about this at AdWeek and AdAge – interesting perspectives.

So, more bad news about magazines. We can allow ourselves to get caught up in this and do our help the decline – by being average – or we can push against it by being engaged magazine specialists. The latter approach works. We do this by being smart about layout, embracing change and being obsessive about titles that perform well in our stores.

Newsagents remain the largest magazine retail channel in Australia. Our market share is something we can leverage better.

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magazine distribution

Excellent promotion of Cleo dresses

Check out the smart display of the dresses being given away with the latest issue of Cleo. basic but effective.

This photo is from out the front of a transit outlet – facing thousands of passers-by every day. Ideal placement to drive impulse purchases.

Sometimes the simplest displays are the best.

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magazines

Great coffee machine give away

We’re thrilled to be giving away a coffee machine as part of our Hallmark Valentine’s Day promotion. That one of our customers will win this is excellent. Harvesting customer data for future promotion is the bonus. Regular in-store prize promotions like this do help drive sales, they also help is position ourselves competitively against other retailers in the centre offering Valentine’s Day cards.

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Greeting Cards

Newsagents talk about Justin Bieber

I was fortunate to be part of  newsagent discussion group in Queensland earlier this week. The topic of customer interest in Justin Bieber came up. I was surprised at the lack of support and his commercial value for newsagents. Everyone commented that One Direction was far more valuable.

What interested me was the customer feedback. Bieber appears to be damaged goods in the minds of the customers overheard.

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Newsagency management

Gordon and Gotch charging small newsagents to receive magazines

I have been contacted by a small rural newsagency which has been presented an ultimatum by Gordon & Gotch: pay $30.00 (plus GST) for a once a week delivery or switch to being a sub agent.  Here’s part of their email to me:

The other day i received in the mail a letter from Gordon & gotch informing us that we were an uneconomic store due to the low volume of magazine currently sold in the store. It went on the say that they want us to have a one day a week delivery costing us $30.00 plus GST a week or move to being a sub agent and arranging the pick up of magazines our self’s.

I understand why Gotch would make a move like this on an account worth well under $100 a month to them. That said, the newsagency model was, in part, established to reach into all parts of Australia, bringing country town and hamlet access to newspapers and magazines.

Newsagents have in the past been told by Gotch representatives that the profitable titles help cover you for the loss making titles. Surely, the profitable deliveries for gotch help fund the public service of reaching these remote parts of the country.

One option for this newsagent is to accept the once a week delivery and charge customers more. The challenge for them is that they are 15k away from a bigger town where people do their weekly shop and will be able to get magazines more regularly and for no premium cost.

If this is a change in policy from Gotch – and I’m trying to find that out- then it’s a conversation that ought to be had in the open between the company and newsagents. Gotch needs to be fair and prepared to enable newsagents to NOT have to take unprofitable titles just as it is refusing to service unprofitable accounts.

We do live in a world of user pays. Fair enough. Gotch (and magazine publishers) can’t live that mantra only when it suits them.

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magazine distribution

Publisher sends newsagents free magazines to sell

We received ten copies of Melbourne Renovator Decorator & Builder yesterday with a note saying they are free to us and that we should sell them for $1.00 each.

This is a yellow pages like publication for decorators, renovators and builders.

While it’s an interesting distribution model, the hand written note and packaging of the copies feels unprofessional. I am not sure how many newsagents will respond by putting the title on the shelves.

For us, the 100% GP is only interesting if we sell at least four copies a week given the cost of shopping centre retail space.  One option we have is to set our own price.

We’re going to think about this title before we put it on the shelves. While it has many flaws, there is an established magazine distribution system in place for good reason.

I’d be interested in hearing from other publishers about this model – free magazines to newsagents – as a means of getting space on our shelves.

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magazine distribution

Promoting What’s for dinner?

We have kicked up our promotion of What’s For Dinner? the New Idea brand sister titles released this week. We like the title and wanted to support it more. It’s an easy sell with a good pitch. Hence our new prime position display at the entrance to our magazine department. This is an example of taking a moment after a new title comes in to see if we are doing all we can to get the best result. We find taking a second look at a promotion can help us improve the results we achieve.

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magazines

Kaspersky update illustrates danger for computer users

Okay I’m not a fan of the Russian Kaspersky virus protection software. I prefer and recommend AVG. Kaspersky users had a good reason to dislike their anti virus software vendor following web access outage for many following an update Monday this week. This automatic update, causing the web outage, is another example of damage that can be done to systems by automatic updates. Computer users could control what updates are applied and when.

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newsagent software

Delayed billing support in newsagency software helps reduce early returns and make magazine more viable

The comprehensive delayed billing support provided in some newsagency software packages is helping newsagents and newsagency employees make more informed decisions around how to manage some magazine titles.

From the indication of the barcode label of delayed billing (see the photo) through to the proper management of delayed billing at seven key tough-points in a newsagency, newsagents are better informed about a title subject to delayed billing.

While the most obvious indicator of delayed billing is on the magazine label, this is just the cosmetic step. There are more important places where delayed billing is indicated and managed in the business, using the software.

While not all newsagency software programs handle delayed billing in this way, any of them can since they all have access to the same data.

The more complete the solution the better for newsagents and magazine publishers.  The latest comprehensive software developments, released last year, provide magazine publishers with another mechanism with which they can challenge the early returning of their titles on the day of release or close to the day of release.

I urge newsagents to use the new delayed billing facilities – beyond the information on the magazine label.

Range is vital to our pitch as magazine specialists. Delayed billing can make some titles we range more viable.

Publishers of longer shelf life titles, greater than a month, should take note of this and consider delayed billing as a means of combatting early returns and providing newsagents more reasons to treat your titles differently.

The extensive delayed billing enhancements have been delivered at no cost to newsagents, publishers or magazine distributors.

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magazine distribution

What are you doing for Chinese New Year?

Since we don’t have lotteries in any of my newsagencies, Chinese New Year is not the focus for it was where we did have a newsagency with lotteries.

I’d be interested to hear what newsagents are doing locally to connect with the season?

The season lends itself to cross promotion with local Chinese restaurants, Chinese community associations and others. Engaging with it in a co-operative way could open your business to a more valuable connection with customers who themselves embrace the season.

2 likes
newsagency marketing
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