Merry Christmas
Merry Christmas to anyone stopping by. I hope the next few days are happy, memorable and relaxing.
HEY AUSSIES, THE LOCAL NEWSAGENCY MAY NOT BE WHAT YOU THINK IT IS (PART 9)
Continuing the series of shining a light on businesses that offer outside what is assumed to be in a local Aussie newsagency in newsXpress Candlewood in Western Australia. This business is close to the the Indian Ocean so it makes sense that their products have the beach flavour as you can see in these photos. This is a shop local visitors love for the gifts and other things they can pick up as a reminder of their trip.
The other different is product price range. Many of these items are gifts beyond trinkets some think are in a newsagency.
newsXpress Candlewood is a good example of a business that has transitioned beyond what many journalists and others think of as the local Aussie newsagency. It’s a testament to Julie and the team for what they have created is relevant locally and certainly not the traditional old-school newsagency.
I am grateful to newsagents like Julie for sharing photos so I can share them here, to reinforce the pitch that the local Aussie is not what many people think it is.
HEY AUSSIES, THE LOCAL NEWSAGENCY MAY NOT BE WHAT YOU THINK IT IS (PART 8)
newsXpress Bairnsdale was your local traditional newsagency, and then things changed. Now, it’s a vibrant gift shop attracting not only local shoppers, but people from outside of town, as well as online – from interstate. David (Tas as he likes to be called) and the team are constantly innovating. During Covid, they pivoted to creating personalised gifts and doing so very well.
Here are some photos of the business that speak to it as a business outside of what many in Australia would consider a Newsagency. Remember, I am sharing these photos to combat the assumptions too many Aussies, including journalists, tend to make about the local newsagency.
Thriving local Aussie Newsagency are not what they used to be, as these photos show. newsXpress Bairnsdale is in a regional Victorian town, far from Melbourne, and on the road to New South Wales. back in the day it would be traditional, but now it has to be innovative retail, and it is. It’s a testament to the vision and work of David and the entire team in the business.
What makes this business even more interesting is that it does not have lotteries – a further break from the traditional.
HEY AUSSIES, THE LOCAL NEWSAGENCY MAY NOT BE WHAT YOU THINK IT IS (PART 7)
Randalls newsagency in Bourke New South Wales is a perfect example of innovative retail in our channel, offering products outside what has been traditional for the local newsagency business, and taking that diversity online to reach shoppers far away from Bourke. In a town of less than 2,000 that is 800km from Sydney, here you have inspiring retail.
Nancy and the team at Randalls newsagency and their website, Back O Bourke Collective run an awesome business, a business that challenges what we think of as a newsagency.
This series is about showing journalists and others that the local Aussie newsagency has changed and while, for sure, there are some running old-school newsagencies rooted in the 60s and 70s, many have transformed their newsagency businesses to be fresh, inviting and vibrant. many are running local newsagency businesses that are changing, evolving, meeting new opportunities.
This is retail in 2022 and beyond, especially local retail, and even more especially local newsagency retail.
The Aussie newsagency channel was created in the 1880s to deliver news publications to the goldfields of Victoria. For decades ours were agency businesses, doing the bidding of the companies for which we were agents. It is only in the last 20 years that some in our channel decided to be retailers rather than agents.
Today, the newsagents who are growing their businesses are retailers first with either no agency business or modest agency business that does not dominate what they do in their businesses.
The local Aussie newsagency has come a long way from what Aussie journalists and others think of us as. The more show how far we have come, the better. This series is about shining a light on some good examples of this, some good examples of retail newsagency businesses that are quite different to what people expect when they think of the classic Aussie newsagency.
Shops like Randalls newsagency in Bourke NSW are a beacon not only for retail newsagents but for local retail more broadly. They are showing that location and size do not matter. They are showing that you can grow by thinking outside of the physical boundaries of your local town.
Whether it is in-store online, there are no borders to what a local newsagency can be, and this is exciting.
What is the future of the local Aussie newsagency? Well, that is up to each newsagent, each retailer in the channel. There is no channel-wide problem. rather, there are thousands of local retailers making decisions every day that will determine the future, and from where I sit, with what I get to see from many colleagues, the future is bright.
HEY AUSSIES, THE LOCAL NEWSAGENCY MAY NOT BE WHAT YOU THINK IT IS (PART 6)
Too many journalists and too many Australians think of the local Aussie newsagency as a paper shop selling magazines, lottery tickets, cigarettes, lollies and stationery. That may have been case twenty or more years ago. Today, it’s different, the local Aussie newsagency is different. A good example of how different is newsXpress Numurkah in Victoria. In this small town of under 5,000 people you can find newsXpress Numurkah, a wonderful and vibrant shop, which is also home to a terrific online baby shop.
These photos tell the story of a vibrant and attractive retail created by Andrea and the team:
The mix of products and price-points plays against out of date assumptions too many make about what a local Aussie newsagency stock and offers.
newsXpress Numurkah is also an excellent example of excellent retail in our channel in regional and rural Australia. The whole team in the business should be proud for their representation of the local newsagency in Numurkah.