Below is a graph showing the sales decay for the major women’s weekly magazines in Australia as recorded over a common month in 10 newsagencies.
Consumers shop early in newsagencies compared to other retail outlets (petrol, convenience, supermarket) based on comparative data I have seen.
The newsagent decay data demonstrates the importance to newsagents of having weekly titles on display on day one of the on sale period. There is no value to newsagents in promoting any of the weekly titles beyond day three of the on sale period.
Comparing this data with data from the same stores from a year ago underscores the importance of day one with 75% of sales growth in 2005 compared to 2004 was achieved on day one.
In my own shops we manage to leverage the decay to our advantage. We actively promote weekly titles in three key traffic positions on days one and two and roll back for the rest of the week to a single position. Whereas we used to actively promote weeklies all week, we have freed up real-estate for other uses later in the week. The sales results speak for themselves.
Early in the week is when we can reach the low hanging fruit and this is what newsagents should focus on.