Newsagents in NSW are putting up a fight to stop clubs from being allowed to sell lottery products. My understanding is that the NSW newsagents association (NANA) has made robust representations to the NSW Minister for Small Business, David Campbell, and that he gave the delegation a fair hearing.
Newsagents rely on lottery traffic to support the sale of other products such as newspapers, magazines and greeting cards. Ten years and more ago lotteries played a lesser role since newspapers and magazines were sold in fewer outlets. Now, with deregulation, newsagents in NSW need the lotteries point of difference to maintain a point of difference.
This is a big issue for newsagents as losing anything more than 10% of lottery traffic would challenge the viability of some businesses.
One could argue that change is inevitable and if a move to clubs better serves consumers so be it. On the other hand, newsagents sell many items for low margin on the basis of the range. To lose such a key item as lotteries would affect the rest of the items they carry and publishers and consumers rely on newsagents offering low cost distribution services.