The toughest part of retailing has been newsagents and book selling, where sales dived throughout 2006, with a 4.5 per cent drop since June. Mr Ganz said many of their sales had been cannibalised by supermarkets.
There are signs retailing is becoming increasingly polarised.
“Top-end and bottom-end retailers are doing well but those focused on the vague middle market are struggling,” said Andrew Cavanagh, of the Australian Centre of Retail Studies.
So reports David Uren in The Australian today. I know of newsagents who would agree with the report and others who would disagree. I’d like to see the data for city versus regional / rural and shopping centre versus high street and a comparison of socio-economic areas.
The newsagents doing well, and there are many, are those who make their businesses stand for something, where they control the business. We have to be bold, not necessarily big, but bold in making a statement about what our business stands for. The more valuable we are to our customers the more they will spend.
We must create our own businesses and turn our backs on the businesses our suppliers created for us more than 100 years ago.