The goal of a Sunday reset is to make a noticeable difference to the shop for you and your customers.

It’s easy to become ‘shop blind’ to your own retail space, walking past the same displays day after day. This routine can make your business feel stale to both you and your regulars. The goal of a Sunday reset is to shatter that stagnation and make a noticeable, energy-boosting difference for everyone. The key to success is you not overthinking it; this is about decisive action, not perfect planning. Give yourself no more than 2 hours.

Follow these easy steps:

1. Declutter. Be ruthless. Chuck out what you know for sure is not selling and will never sell. Holding onto it costs you valuable space. Throw away anything at the counter that’s not used or of value there. Remove all products currently at the counter. Take down main product displays and placements in the first 2 metres inside the shop.
2. Rebuild. Rebuild with fresh eyes. This is your chance to experiment. Put products at the counter people will understand and can easily grab. Include some high-margin products you think people would never buy at the counter. Create product displays and placements in the first 2 metres featuring items you would never normally put at the front of the shop.
3. Talk about it. Jump on your business social media pages and brag about what you’ve done. Post before-and-after photos to highlight the change.
4. Create a “Discovery Zone”. Designate one small, high-traffic area, a single shelf, a small table by the entrance, or the corner of your counter, as your dedicated “Discovery Zone”. Commit to changing only this spot every single week, no matter what. Feature a single product, a small collection of related items, or something completely unexpected. This trains your regular customers to look there first for what’s new, creating a sense of anticipation and ensuring your shop always has a fresh point of interest, even on weeks when you don’t have time for a full reset.

Do things you’d not do in your business, even things you are unsure of – for it’s this type of exp[erimentation where you can find fresh success.

What you want is shoppers entering the shop to notice that it’s different and to comment on it. This alone is a win for you since they are connecting change with your shop, it means they notice you.

You should feel good about a Sunday reset. Its good work to do on your business.

Too often, small business retailers including newsagents think their payday will come when they sell the business. It won’t. Thinking it will stops too many retailers focussing on what matters most:  daily profitability.

A valuable business tomorrow is built upon the profitable decisions you make today.

For this reason, I have long championed a simple, powerful mantra: Make every day your payday.

This principle sharpens your focus on the single goal of driving business value every day. It provides the lens through which you should evaluate every decision. I encourage you to ask yourself constantly: Does this action add to the profitability of my business today? If the answer is no, it’s worth asking why you are doing it.

The challenge, then, is how to put this into practice.

Here are the actionable strategies I recommend for building daily value in your retail business:

• Optimise Your Roster. Most businesses can find opportunities to lower labour costs without compromising the customer experience. A lean, effective roster is key. Use tech tools, like the recent AI innovation, to reduce hours you pay for.
• Quit Dead Stock. Look at dead stock weekly. Cut what’s not working. Too many retailers do not look at dead stock at all because it upsets them. This denial can cost a business thousands of dollars every few months. Dead stock is one of the biggest drains on profit I’ve ever seen.
• Trade outside what’s expected of you. Don’t stock only what’s expected for your type of business. Offer products people don’t expect to see. This speed bump approach to what you stock can slow people, have them notice, and buy.
• But The Best You Can. Negotiate the best possible terms and always pay suppliers on time to capture valuable settlement discounts.
• Price Strategically. Don’t hesitate to adjust your prices. Mark up as high as you reasonably can without harming unit sales.
• Increase Average Transaction Value. Help shoppers buy more each visit. Loyalty programs, product bundling, strategic product location and multi-buy offers are effective tools.
• Curate Your Counter. Reserve the point-of-sale area for high-margin, impulse-buy items that are easily understood and complement a customer’s primary purchase. Change the counter weekly.
• Deploy Your Best People. Your bets sellers should be always customer-facing.
• Analyse Category Performance. Measure every product category by its gross profit ($GP$) contribution. Discontinue underperforming lines.
• Sell 24/7. Ensure your business can make sales even when the doors are closed. A functional and user-friendly online store is essential.
• Expand Your Customer Base. Actively promote your business beyond your usual foot traffic and brand recognition to attract new demographics.
• Create Compelling Displays. Use stunning window displays to attract passersby and design in-store layouts that encourage customers to browse beyond their intended purchase.
• Leverage Product Adjacency. Understand what products are frequently bought together. Position them strategically to encourage a deeper, more valuable shopping basket.

Take Ownership of Your Profitability

For me, this is the most critical step. Ultimately, the financial health of your business is your responsibility. It is easy to blame suppliers, landlords, or other external factors, but I’ve learned that profitability always comes down to the decisions you make and the actions you take.

1. Pay down debt.
2. Always have access to an up to date P&L.
3. Keep a clean balance sheet.

A relentless and clear focus on daily profit is the most reliable path to growth. This is far more powerful than waiting for a potential payday from a future sale.

This entire approach relies on one crucial habit: measuring the performance of your business. Your POS software provides the data you need to make these informed, profitable decisions. Use it as the essential tool it is.

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I first shared make every day your payday 17 years ago when I saw that valuations of small retail businesses, like newsagencies, fall. This post today is refreshed and refocussed.

If you’d like to talk about this, I can be reached on 0418 321 338 or mark@newsxpress.com.au

There is relevant Australian data for August 2025 from the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) Monthly Household Spending Indicator. I think there are insights here for our channel.

Here’s a breakdown of the key figures and trends for August 2025 (seasonally adjusted, month-on-month change, current prices) direct from the ABS website:

• Total Household Spending: Rose slightly by 0.1% month-on-month. Annually, it increased by 5.0% compared to August 2024.
• Goods vs. Services: Services spending rose by 0.5%, while goods spending fell by 0.2%. This suggests a continued shift in consumer preference toward services.
• Discretionary vs. Non-Discretionary: Discretionary spending saw a small increase of 0.2%, while non-discretionary (essential) spending declined by 0.1%.

Key Spending Categories (Discretionary and Others):

• Largest Increases:
  • Transport (+0.8%) – This category includes discretionary items like vehicle purchases as well as non-discretionary motoring goods and services.
  • Miscellaneous goods and services (+0.8%) – This is a broad category that includes discretionary items like personal care, personal effects, and other services.
  • Clothing and footwear (+0.5%)
• Largest Declines:
  • Alcoholic beverages and tobacco (-0.9%)
  • Recreation and culture (-0.9%)
  • Furnishings and household equipment (-0.1%)

Now, for some context for newsagents:

• Newsagencies sell items that fall into several of the discretionary spending categories, such as:
  • Recreation and culture: (e.g., magazines, puzzles/games, toys often sold at newsagents) which overall saw a significant -0.9% decline in August.
  • Alcoholic beverages and tobacco: This category, which is traditional on some newsagency businesses, also saw a decline of -0.9%.
  • Miscellaneous goods and services: Discretionary sub-categories like Personal effects (e.g., stationery, gifts) saw an overall increase in this broad category.

Industry-specific reports for newsagencies suggest:

• Traditional pillars struggling: Newsagents continue to experience year-on-year declines in traditional areas like magazine sales, newspaper sales, stationery revenue, and tobacco/candy sales (as of late 2025 reports reflecting recent trends).
• Growth in hobbies/gifts/books/homewares/collectibles: Growth is being reported in categories like toys, cards, games, jigsaws, gifts, homewares and collectibles like pop culture and related items – suggesting that a newsagency with a diversified product offering might be experiencing a better result overall, where the decline in traditional items is offset by growth in hobby/gift-related discretionary purchases. Typically, this diversified business has an overall better gross profit position.

Overall, the August 2025 household spending data shows consumer activity moderating, particularly for certain discretionary goods, while services and some goods like transport saw increases.

After all that waffle, the question has to be: where is your business in this?

If your business performance is flat or declining, taking action, new action, is the only option. Continuing doing what you’re doing will continue with the results you have been experiencing.

Three weeks ago newsXpress announced to its members Project Deep Dive, an off-site three-day small group retreat for newsagents to unpack, assess and refocus their business, in pursuit of a brighter future.

The one retreat planned quickly filled, so we scheduled another.

The Deep Dive is a confidential off-site session for no more than 8 businesses (more likely 4) and some of the newsXpress head office crew. Each Deep Dive will be conducted in places like Wellington, New Zealand, Seminyak, Bali and Port Douglas, Queensland. While the locations may seem exotic, the objective is, as much as possible, to take people away from their world, to provide them space to look at their business with perspective, to find a valuable path forward.

Each day starts at 8am with 4 hours of business. Each participating business will  have 20 minutes to present their business over the three days being transparent as to business performance, the local situation, opportunities and challenges. This will be followed by discussion of those businesses and workshopping options to fit the needs of the owners of the business.

Some will want to explore when and how to exit, others will want to discover new revenue streams, others will want to grow their retail footprint while others will want to turn their business profitable.

The goal of the deep dive is to offer a safe and confidential space in which all participating can work on each other’s business, consider opportunities and help plot a path forward.

I am keen for each participating business to come away with achievable action items they otherwise may not have discovered.

newsXpress is funding the meeting room, catering and accomodation for attendees. There is no fee to attend, no participation cost other than getting to the location.

Now, why am I writing about this here in this public place? I am considering making a Deep Dive session available to non newsXpress newsagents. If this interests you, please reach out direct and confidentially to me at mark@newsxpress.com.au. I don’t care if you are part of another group. What I do care about is that you want your business to thrive.

For any newsagent, member or not, who feels “stuck” or is seeking a new direction, this is an incredible opportunity. The value offered is disproportionately high compared to the cost required to participate. This project will be a huge success. We think others will copy it, which would be good.

Project Deep Dive is an exclusive newsXpress initiative.

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Mark Fletcher founded newsagency software company Tower Systems and is the CEO of newsXpress, a marketing group serving innovative newsagents keen to evolve their businesses for a bright future. You can reach him on mark@newsxpress.com.au or 0418 321 338.

How long should you hold stock for in your retail business? Someone once said never let a stock item have a birthday in your shop.

The total cost of holding inventory is a combination of direct holding costs (like storage space and labor) and the opportunity cost of the capital that was used to purchase the stock.

Imagine you have $10,000.

• You can either buy $10,000 worth of stock (inventory).
• Or you can put that $10,000 into a savings account that earns 5% interest ($500 per year).

If you choose to buy the stock, you give up the chance to earn that $500 in interest. That forgone $500 is the opportunity cost. It’s separate from the money you then have to spend on a warehouse shelf (holding cost) to store your new stock.

If your $10,000 in inventory is not generating at least a good interest result, you’re behind.

1. Identify and Categorise: Use your POS software  to run a Stock Aging Report. This is your most important tool. It will show you exactly which items haven’t sold in 30, 60, 90, 180, or 365+ days.

2. Create a Markdown Cadence: Don’t wait for the birthday! Create a store policy for taking action. For example:

• 60 Days (No Sale): Review product placement. Is it visible? Is it merchandised well?
• 90 Days (No Sale): First markdown. A small discount (e.g., 15-20%) to encourage a sale and start recouping capital.
• 120 Days (No Sale): Second, more aggressive markdown (e.g., 30-40%). Move the item to a dedicated clearance section.
• 180 Days (No Sale): This item is officially “dead stock.” The goal is now liquidation, not profit. Bundle it with a popular product, reduce it to cost, or even sell it at a loss.

Why sell at a loss? Because the $20 you get back from a $50 cost item is $20 of fresh capital you can reinvest in a new product that will sell. Keeping the dead item on the shelf gives you a return of $0 and continues to incur holding costs.

3. Learn and Prevent: After you clear the dead stock, analyse it. Why didn’t it sell?

• Was the price wrong?
• Was it a poor product choice?
• Did you buy too many?
• Was it a seasonal item you bought too late?

Use this data to make smarter buying decisions in the future.

I see too many retail business owners ignoring the age of stock, allowing dead stock items to take up space on the shelves, not providing a return for the business. This is poor retail management.