The QNF has warned newsagents who have ceased paying their ANF membership fees to write a resignation letter to the ANF. They published this advice after finding around twenty newsagents who had stopped paying thinking that was all they had to do to resign. The QNF has advised newsagents that the ANF may charge non financial members for the period until they receive their resignation in writing. By resigning, the ANF will have a more accurate membership base and therefore be better able to quaote accurate representation numbers to companies they pitch to and government bodies they engage with.
The qnf advice is right. They are still on the anf membership list. My information is that the anf today has less than 1,000 newsagents as financial members. If newsagents knew the true story…
I say “my information” because inside is now outside.
Hi insider sorry to here you are now on the outside but when there is no light at the end of the tunnel it only gets darker. Now you’re on the outside I hope you can see where you’re going!
I think that for inside – the light at the end of the tunnel was an oncoming train!
Thanks inside – please feel free to drop by anytime.
The anf is a waste of time and money. Why any newsagent pays them money is beyond me.
Dear Julie,
Its about national representation. Yes there are flaws, yes there is politics, yes there is inefficiencies. Gee sounds like the government of the day, even the NSW labour government.
Guess what, we still pay taxes, and elect members of parliament to represent us nationally.
So with this in mind, i would think that a more psoitive approach by all parties concerned should be the route that is taken.
We need to take notice of the pharmacy guild, and present a strong national body. It seems to me that the ANF being the only national body with some sort of infrastructure, could still be the vehicle, with the right people in control, and with the right level of support to represent newsagents on a national level.
The sins of the past need not determine our future. Let current deeds guide us to some sort of newsagent nirvana!!!
Chris from Reservoir
What the ANF did to our businesses with the BXP deal is not something that i am going to forget about anytime soon .Lets have a look at there advice when they said keep paying ,what a jke how much did they want us to loose .I a presuming that that advice would have come from a lawyer maybe the same one that looked over the BXP contract
Shaun, it would have been more palatable to newsagents had the ANF been more trsnaparent during their relationship and focused 100% on the needs of newsagents and not the directors following the collaple of Bill Express. mark
For us, it wasn’t just the Bill Express disaster, but also the fact that for all the faxes, emails and updates we were inundated with, nothing was changed for us by any representative body in 6 years. Well, unless you count the 2 delivery fee increases from Qld Newspapers (still not enough).
My personal issue with the industry ‘representatives’ was and still is the narky backbiting against one another (state vs national, etc). NOT professional and most certainly NOT focussed on the future of the newsagency industry. I choose to remain independent rather than have to deal with the schoolyard antics of these so-called ‘representatives’.
For so long as we choose to stay independent and sit on a fence somewhere our channel can only dream of having the influence and power of the Pharmacy Guild. What has happened cannot be changed, but it can be learnt from. I would bet that there is not a newsagent in the country that has not learnt something from the BXP fiasco, but if we continue to dwell on it as seems to be the case with so many, then we will continue to languish on the outskirts of relevance.
We have a new CEO in the ANF and we need to give him the benefit of the doubt if our channel is to have any real clout. He together with many of the board members were not involved in the BXP fiasco and therefore do not deserve to be tarred with that brush. They do need to pick up the pieces and also learn from the errors of the past, and we need to give them that opportunity in the absence of any real alternative.
It is difficult to move forward if we keep looking in the rear view mirror.
Glen,
The current Board was involved last year. They were not transparent with newsagents. They did not provide good advice. They focused on protecting themsleves and not their members.
This could have easily been fixed and some trust restored. that is was not is a reason many resigned from the ANF.
mark
Mark
What is the alternative for our industry to achieve unity and enjoy the status and influence enjoyed by the likes of the Pharmacy Guild? Nothing will be achieved if everyone walks away.
I believe that the ANF is the only real option, but that they again need to earn their stripes and regain the respect they once had. It is important that they are given the opportunity.
Glen,
There is a secretariat model developing between functioning states. No commercial activity, pure transparent representation. This appeals to me.
I do not want Directors putting their personal needs ahead of those of their members.
Mark
Glen,
Believing that the ANF is the only real option for newsagents is akin to believing that the only real option for curing snakebite is death.
It is an admission that, as an industry, we believe in placing our faith in 2nd-raters who have consistently failed their members, not only on Bill Express, but on a whole raft of issues. These guys have as much ability to earn their stripes as zebras do of changing them.
Many years ago there was a show on TV called The 3 Stooges – it was funny in a slapstick sort of way but it died because people sought more sophisticated forms of entertainment. Their management company Comedy III Productions Inc though lives on today. They say history repeats itself and I have a feeling that our suppliers, publishers and distributors now have their own comedy called The 3500 Stooges. The main difference is that our management company ANF died long ago whilst the joke, from an outsiders perspective, is likely to continue.
The ANF has foregone so many opportunities to earn back some respect from the members and have performed so many extraordinary gymnastic feats such as ducking for cover whilst simultaneously placing their heads in the sand and up whatever orifice was available at the time, avoiding well aimed and deserved arrows as they delivered various stabbings to the back of state organisations that they must surely qualify as members of The Flying Fruit Fly Circus – not as an organisation capable and responsible enough to represent the industry.
The ANF is dead and the corpse is awaiting burial – it is time to out and oust those who want to perpetuate it and those state organisations who wax and wane and continue to vacillate on whether they want to be marketers or industry-representatives (Well hellooo VANA), time to move on and implement the secretariat model!
Jim,
Well said.