The National Federation of Retail Newsagents has come out fighting overnight in response to the Office of Fair Trading’s Consultation Document on its draft opinion on Newspaper and Magazine Distribution.
The NFRN press release is strong compared to what we have seen in Australia from many (not all) newsagent associations as that channel has become less regulated.
Rather than just complain about the OFT position the NFRN has proposed an alternative with sound commercial principles:
As an alternative to a full market investigation, and consistent with the NFRN’s position throughout, the newsagents’ representative body is suggesting that the OFT should use its powers to allow the news industry to produce a new comprehensive and legally enforceable Code of Practice that would embrace controlled “passive selling” for both newspapers and magazines (to deal with cases of persistently bad service from a monopoly wholesaler), include improvements within the supply chain to deliver better service to consumers and, importantly, introduce much improved news industry self-regulation, under the watchful eye of an independent Industry Ombudsman.
This battle is interesting here on the other side of the world because it demonstrated how an industry association can strongly represent its members and it provides further evidence of how the distribution of news and information is in play and the potential harm of this for small businesses.