The great divide in magazine sales data
Looking at magazine sales data for the last twelve weeks to July 15 for my newsagency compared to the same period last year, the gulf between successful categories and failig categories has widened compared to my last look three months ago. Here is unit sales growth or decline by major category:
Buying and Selling – down 19%
Computers – down 34%
Motoring – down 16%
Music – down 14%
Women’s Weeklies – up 26%
Women’s Interests – up 22%
Most others were up or down less than 10%.
These are extraordinary numbers. The falls are greater than I saw in the first three months of this year. Look at the Women’s titles. These are the titles where we compete with five other outlets in my centre yet we are achieving five and six times the industry average growth. That this extraordinary growth is not reflected in the other categories has me stumped. Our offering is excellent, the titles well displayed and our pitch is backed by a valuable loyalty (discount) program.
I wonder if this data reflects the end of the newsagent magazine range as we know it in Australia or is my store an aberration. I see enough data from other newsagencies to suggest this is not the case. The gap between successful categories and the others is a shock and everyone involved in the newsagent channel ought to take note.
Every newsagency is a reflection of the community it serves and while I would expect some variation in category performance, there is no doubt some magazine categories are in rapid steep decline.
The Age today starts its second 
Memo to magazine distributors: enough with the computer and digital photography guides already! We are drowning in such junk from here, the US and the UK. Too many titles. Too much cash being sucked out of newsagencies. It’s nuts. The magazine distribution system to newsagents makes it too easy to distribute junk and small business newsagents suffer the consequences.
We have been running a magazine loyalty program in my newsagency since August 2004 resulting in same store sales growth of more than four times the national average. Australian Women’s Weekly is the single most redeemed magazine. That is, it is the title most customers choose as their free magazine. Last month, 10% of our AWW sales were copies redeemed as a result of our loyalty program. I am curious as to what it says about the title. I have talked to two customers this week who chose AWW for their free magazine. One said it was her treat, she was proud that her husband’s magazine purchases led to the treat. The other was pretty blunt “I wouldn’t buy it bit if it’s free…”. She went on to say she loves the magazines but that she didn’t have as much time as she used to.
Emap’s ZOO Weekly has dropped its cover price again and sells at $1.95 this week. Newsagents need help supporting the title. I’d like the publisher to provide point of sale materials to enable display of ZOO next to newspapers. Many newspaper fixtures do not facilitate this – hence the suggestion that the publisher provide a stand to encourage the add sale with a newspaper purchase. Without such a unit, ZOO is placed with men’s titles and that’s a long way from newspapers. I see ZOO as an Alpha type purchase and Alpha comes close to selling out when promoted next to the newspapers.
As this 