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

When you run out of space

frank_madison.JPGAll of our magazine promotional spaces were allocated at our Frankston newsagency but the team wanted to give support to Madison with the free eye liner. As good retailers, they shuffled products and created a new display space at the counter, near the entrance to the shop. Another reason for giving Madison prominence this week is the media coverage from the finale of the TV show Project Runway. This new promotional location is near one of our two busiest registers – we are looking forward to how it works.

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magazines

Magazine diaries as impulse items

diary_impulse.JPGWe are promoting magazine branded diaries as an impulse item at the counter in the slim spinner shown in the photo. In the past we have promoted these in our regular diary section. The idea behind the counter pitch is that customers buying the related magazines are more likely to buy a sister diary on impulse. We are contemplating an offer around a diary / magazine pack but are yet to work our the process and in-store pitch. Also, we are likely to wait until we have more magazine branded diaries in-store to appeal to a broader demographic.

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Diaries

Promoting House & Garden magazine

frank_houseg.JPGLast month we moved our ACP Magazines promotional stand to be next to our newspapers. We then created a display for Belle magazine on the back of the stand – all but one copy sold off the stand. Buoyed with that success, our team at Frankston has created a display for House & Garden for the back of the ACP promotional stand – there are two pockets from which customers can purchase the magazine off the stand – it is important that displays work for us, that purchase is easy.

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magazines

The magazine honey pot

The photo below shows how we use our top selling weekly magazines to drive sales of other categories. By reclaiming the top rows of the waterfall we are able to drive sales of parenting, house & garden, food, health and garden titles – all growing categories.

fhn_weeklymags.JPG

We are consistent in our placement – health with health, garden with garden etc. We know from our top-ups that these titles sell from here.

We call this our honey pot strategy because we are driving sales of less popular titles by placing them around our most popular titles.

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magazines

Proof publishers listen

bugs_putaway.JPGThis newsagent putaway card inserted with every copy of Part 1 of Real Life Bugs is proof that publishers listen. This coupon, promoting newsagent putaway of the partwork, has been included as a result of representations by me and, I am sure, other newsagents to partworks publishers. If they wanted to only pay lip-service to our request, the coupon would have been cheap and nasty. Instead, we have an attractive coupon, in keeping with the style of the partwork.

Smart newsagents are leveraging this coupon and providing customers with putaway sign up forms when they purchase part 1.

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magazines

Banks miss the point on Bill Express

I had a lengthy conversation with a regional manager for a bank yesterday on behalf of a newsagent who was having trouble getting the bank to refund money they had deducted from the newsagent’s account without authority.

I understand why the bank takes they view they do – they are skeptical of a customer who says that a long standing direct debit is wrong. This is easier than them having to fully research the situation. The problem with the Bill Express direct debits is that newsagents signed them for one business and the payments now in dispute have been taken out by another business.

I expect that yesterday’s conversation will lead to the newsagent receiving over $1,000 back from their bank.

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Bill Express

ANF to chase new revenue streams

The ANF Board is placing more emphasis on commercial skills than Association skills in its pursuit of a new CEO.  The advertisement published yesterday by Hays Recruitment makes it clear the organisation is looking for new revenue streams.

The Board ought to have surveyed newsagents as to what they are looking for in an industry association.  I suspect that newsagents would rate association services more highly than commercial services.  This is where the ANF has caused grief for itself over the last eight years.  I suspect it is a key reason many newsagents have quit the association.

My view is that the ANF ought to shrink considerably and focus on national policy as this is the one area not covered by current state associations.

I suspect that the legal team advising the NSW newsagent instigated Class Action on the Bill Express matter might have a view on the ANF involvement in commercial matters.

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Newsagency challenges

Cards for Rosh Hashanah

rosh_hashanah.JPGRosh Hashanah is an important celebration in the Jewish calendar. It is important to us because we have another opportunity to demonstrate that we are the greeting card specialists. We have a good range of Rosh Hashanah cards in our newsagencies for this reason – we cannot be a specialist and ignore seasons such as this. Knowing what we stand for in cards frames all of our decisions. More newsagents should support minor seasons since our major competitors will ignore them including Rosh Hashanah.

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Greeting Cards

Promoting ink on TV

The TV commercial newsXpress is running to promote its ink and toner offer is working well. Beyond the buzz in the newsagency channel, consumers are reacting to the ad. It pitched our newsagency and others under the banner as go to places for ink and toner at competitive prices.

It’s great to have a newsagent brand on TV and it is even better to be actively competing with the majors! The Hot Ink campaign shows that we are competitive and this feeling rubs off to other departments when ink customers are in-store.For those new here, I am a Director of newsXpress.

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newsagency marketing

Sampling the monthly magazine

The folks at Good magazine and Starbucks have got together to provide a single sheet single topic sampler promoting Good to Starbucks customers. The single sheet sampler, called Good Sheet, will run for 11 weeks.

I like the idea of sampling magazines, especially monthlies. I’d certainly engage with any publisher wishing to test such an approach to building their reach.

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Uncategorized

Promoting In Style at the counter

fhn_in_style.JPGWe are promoting In Style at the counter at Forest Hill this week. I know I complained here a week ago about about tote bag overload. The bag with In Style is substantial and claimed to be valued at $49.95 – it is considerably better quality than the usual magazine giveaway tote bag.

In Style is a popular title for us so we figured the giveaway supported by a counter display would help lead to easy quick sales.  This counter position works better than power end displays for some titles – it is all about the offer.

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magazines

Emirates goes paperless

The move by Emirates to move to a paperless plane is interesting – they are replacing printed material (magazines, menus etc) with digital content to save fuel.  I think we will encounter more conversations about the environmental impact of printed material in the coming years from the cost of distribution to the waste once we are done with the product.  The news coverage of the move by Emirates shows there is considerable interest.

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magazines

Magazine Club Card goes international

mag_club.JPGSteven Denham has launched a Magazine Club Card in his newsagency at West Chiltington, West Sussex in the UK. This card is modeled on the card we launched four years ago. I am excited to see how it travels in the UK marketplace. Our original plan was to run the card for six months and then rest it. Resulting sales have seen us maintain the card for four years. It is a pleasure to introduce the card to a customer for the first time see the appreciation. This is what brings them back to us and not to the supermarket for magazines. I hope the card is a great commercial success in the UK.

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magazines

Behind the Fairfax job cuts

Jane Schulze writing at The Australian explains the extent to which the fall in classified revenue for Fairfax newspapers contributed to the recent decision by the company to cut 550 jobs.  The recent research by Goldman Sachs JB Were to which Schulze refers offers more evidence of why newsagents need to look at the revenue balance of their businesses.  While newspapers will be important for years to come, their level of importance will change, as Fairfax is experiencing already.

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Media disruption

Finding space for summer magazines

We love British magazines at our Forest Hill store. This time of year it is a challenge to find space for the Summer issues, special editions catering to summer reading in the UK. Here are four popular titles currently requiring an extra pocket of space.

summereditions.JPG

We have found the space because the sales will be there. It just means care when placing stock out – management level decisions are necessary.

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magazines

Promoting desk calendars

fhn_desk_cal.JPGWe have a table of small desk calendars on display between our diaries and calendars. This is a considerably bigger range of desk calendars than we had last year. It is different to what you would expect to see in a newsagency – because we have sourced this from non newsagent suppliers. It is part of our strategy of broadening our range of calendars and related lines, part of the newsXpress calendar offer. Calendars have grown for us over the last three years and we are chasing more growth this year.

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Calendars

Closed for a week

The newsagency I blogged about a year ago – reporting that they often closed early – is closed for a week.  The sign says it is closed due to family circumstances.  With the number of relieving newsagents available, this newsagency does not have to close, especially on this busy street.  It makes all newsagents look bad.

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Newsagency challenges

The Age trumps itself

age_happyjohn.JPGMarketing has trumped editorial at The Age again today. The headline promoting exclusive excerpts from Peter Costello’s new book is partially covered a stuck on ad. Not happy John becomes happy John. I bet they are not happy. These ads litter streets and devalue newspapers.

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newspaper masthead desecration

How I would spend $1,000 from Trading Post

Earlier this week I blogged about the competition the Trading Post is running in Victoria, offering $1,000 for the best idea from a newsagent on how they would spend the $1,000 on the business. I said at the time in response to a comment that I would not post my ideas because I wanted to see the ideas my own teams put together. Since the teams are settled on their submissions, I thought I’d share one of my ideas for spending the $1,000 from the Trading Post.

I would see how far I could stretch the $1,000 by using it as a motivator to get jobs done which require labour, which have been put off and which would add to the business. I’d focus on small projects in the business which help improve efficiency or sales. For example:

  • The wall above our magazine units – up to the ceiling – looks tired. We would paint this. The paint would cost $100. The labour would be free.
  • We could create another small 50cm x 50cm slat-wall display at a second counter position for impulse magazine and other displays. The materials would cost $150 properly finished and we could install this ourselves.

These are two example of how we could stretch the $1,000, improve and the business and generate revenue from the investment.

I’d look for small projects like these which have been put off and which have a labour component – and thereby I get to stretch the value of the $1,000.

I have other ideas but these two are where I would start.

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newsagency marketing

New health magazine

Just Health & Beauty is a new health magazine – which you will not find on newsagent shelves. It has been produced by and exclusively for the Chemist Warehouse stores. Free magazines like this, in tough economic times, could pull some consumers away from their usual paid-for title.

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magazines

Pepper Homeloans and Bill Express money

Pepper Homeloans has written to some newsagents claiming to act on behalf of the trust to which they claim Technology Business International assigned rights in relation to the rental of Bill Express equipment. The Pepper letter requests that Bill Express equipment rental arrears be paid. It lists a contact number for newsagents to call to discuss the matter.

The QNF continues to the newsagent association providing good leadership on this matter. Below I publish with their permission what they have sent to members today:

Please find attached (below) Hank Spier’s advice regarding Pepper Homeloans correspondence received this week.

We further suggest that all newsagents may wish to contact their Bank and give notice that any direct debit for the amount mentioned in your letter of demand from Pepper Homeloans should not be allowed to go through on the 25th of this month (QNF are unsure as to which company may attempt to debit your account as they have used different company names, previously using TBI & CHP).

The attached advice was to go out to only those newsagents represented by Hank Spier but the QNF & Hank feel that it is important that all newsagents are informed.

As Hank Spier representing 100’s of newsagents with this issue and the ongoing issue of Bill Express, he is presently being inundated with phone calls and emails.

If you wish him to represent you simply email him with your details, he is unable to reply but will include you on his list.

The details required are:- Full Name & Company Name, Business Name (shop name), Address, Phone, Email address

For wording in the email:- “we wish to be represented by you with regard to this Bill Express issue”

If you have any specific questions you can direct them to the QNF via email.

Here is the advice from their legal team:

Pepper Homeloans.

Some of you will have received letters from Pepper Homeloans headed Over Due Notification and demanding payments.

These letters follow on from similar letters some time ago from Mobius.

I have today written to Pepper along the same lines as I did to Mobius, namely we regard the claims as invalid and their action unlawful. We have also asked them to prove the validity of their demands.

We have also said to Pepper, as we did to Mobius, that should they take any legal action against anyone in our group we will immediately move in Court against them.

In relation to the letter you have just received from Pepper I suggest that you either write back to Pepper saying that the matter is with solicitors acting for newsagents and newsagents associations or simply do not respond.

ACCC

I met with ACCC last week. Their investigation is well underway.

Hopefully some positive action will be announced very soon by the ACCC.

Hank Spier. Special Counsel. Sweeney Commercial.

For those interested, Pepper is owned by Oakwood (Luxembourg). Merrill Lynch is a major shareholder in Okawood.

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Bill Express
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