No wonder newsagents suffer from high blood pressure when Reader’s Digest and magazine distributor NDD combine to dump a title like this on their shelves just before Christmas. First up, this is a book and not a magazine. Unless newsagents are in the book space, it is unlikely they will have the appropriate space for display. At $29.95, the cost to a newsagent for shrinkage would be too high to risk putting the title on the shelves. Further, a four month shelf life is ridiculousl.

Once again, NDD grabs newsagent cash for a title which will be cash-flow negative in all but 1% to 2% of newsagents. This is unconscionable behavior. Newsagents ought to complain to the ACCC as NDD has no data basis on which it can justify sending this title.

Shame on Reader’s Digest. Shame on NDD.

NDD, the magazine distributor which claims to be expert in this area ought to know better than to send more Australia’s Best Cars Magazine to newsagents with an expected shelf life of eight months. What is worse is that this title was supplied too late for early return in December so we are out at least a month in terms of cash-flow.

From the scale out I have seen, it appears little attention has been paid to the sales of car magazines – meaning gross over supply. Not that the RACV, NRMA, RACQ et al care. Their hands are all over this unconscionable conduct because, as publishers of the title, they set the size of the print run and this is, I suspect, what NDD must scale out contractually – with little regard to what will actually sell.

So, Happy Christmas newsagents, enjoy being ripped off by a magazine model which is stuffed at this bottom end of titles, a magazine model which despite rhetoric, is not changing. There is no need for meetings and conferences to agree on a best practice model, if it won;t sell, don;t send it, if it has a sell through rate of less than 50%, send less. NDD abuses the system and says it will talk about changes and every month the talks go on they abuse newsagents as they have with this title.

What’s worse is that the auto clubs have created a website to promote the title and do not list newsagents as outlets carrying the title. This is offensive.

I’ve been looking at data from eight newsagencies and each is showing good growth in the Current Affairs and Business magazine category. I put this down to a combination o the election, and strong property interest. The other category which performed well in November is Buying & Selling with double digit growth being achieved in several newsagencies. This is a surprise to me as the category has been tracking down for around two years.

Benchmarking among a group of newsagents around magazine categories is fascinating and leads the newsagents participating to go back to their stores and adjust on what they have seen others achieve.

Check out idiomag for a new model in music magazines. As their website says:

idiomag is a high-quality, digital magazine currently personalized to each individual user’s interests in music. It keeps them “in the know” about the artists and genres they love, as well as finding new artists that they might like. It includes feature articles, reviews, galleries and interactive elements in an engaging format that users can access whenever and wherever they want it. Users can read the article, play the track, view the video, check for gigs, and go off to buy the mp3 or ticket or share their views with their friends.

We utilise all the knowledge this generates about our users and their interests to deliver the most relevant experience and to target the most compelling advertising.

Very impressive. Their Facebook integration is an excellent example of using web 2.0 social media to connect friends based on music stories they are reading.

Newsagents received House & Garden magazine on Monday of this week. We have been told it is to be on sale for two months. Smart newsagents will push hard to sell out in the next two weeks because who would buy a Christmas themed title after Christmas? Such a long on-sale is nuts. What this really does is stop newsagents returning for a credit prior to February which means it could be the end of March before we get our money back. What is this long on-sale period other than a boost to the cashflow of ACP Magazines?

We have replaced our display of gree magazines at one of our counters with this display of property and investment titles.

Property and investment is an often forgotten category in newsagencies, relegated to second class real-estate. We are hoping, through the display, to remind people that we have a broad offering.

We know from our sales data that the work we have been putting into this category elsewhere in the business is delivering above industry benchmark growth – proving there is a good market in our newsagency.

While these displays are extra work, they payoff is the reinforcement that we are magazine specialists.

I am surprised at the cover of this National Australian Fishing Annual. Maybe the have used a sexy, even suggestive (look at the fish), shot before. Compared to other fishing titles, this one would look more at home elsewhere in the category. There are more photos like this in the magazine. Maybe they are chasing a new demographic to fishing. I don’t mind as I’m only the retailer. However, there is a valid questions as to where to place the title – if they are chasing a different demographic. Guys looking for bikini clad girls playing with fish will not be looking in the fishing section.

For days ago we placed a column of Lovatts crossword and puzzle titles next to Australian Women’s Weekly. While we have done this before with success, this time the results have been excellent – especially with the Christmas themed title. We are tracking a 25% sales increase for the crossword product off an already strong base. The bump from Wednesday to today is obvious on the sales graph.

We have two promotional columns like this near AWW and the weeklies.

We will leave this display in place for a week before replacing it with another – probably Christmas themed crafts.

The Australian is reporting today that PBL Media, owners of ACP Magazines, has purchased half of the local version of OK! OK! has quickly carved out success in the tough weekly magazine marketplace as I have blogged previously.

While it’s a 50/50 joint venture, I’d expect ACP to lead on the distribution side – making a tougher retail real-estate battle for Pacific Magazines. They need either a much stronger Famous or a new offer in the marketplace.

As the report in The Australian says, the major weeklies are having a tough time and that OK! is bucking that trend with sales growth of 18.8% year on year. That’s what I am seeing – strong growth. Hence our decision to allocate more real-estate in the high traffic areas.

I am disappointed about this move from a newsagent perspective because of what it means for competition. However, for ACP it makes sense. I hope that OK! continues as is because it ain’t broke.