A new partwork, Baked & Delicious, launches on Monday July 18. Baked & Delicious looks set to be the most significant partwork launch in years. In the UK, part 1 sold in excess of 600,000 copies. Given the extraordinary sales of food titles here, I expect per-capita sales in Australia to surpass sales in the UK.
While the publisher sees the target market as women 25 and over, housewives, I see it more broadly than that given the people buying food titles and the broad interest in the various TV food shows. That said, a survey of customers in the UK revealed that 95% of people buying the title were women.
Each fortnightly issue comes with a new piece of silicone bakeware and a magazine with recipes. It is the bakeware which will make this partwork appealing. The items include: cupcake cases, pastry brush & spatula, loaf mould, flan moulds and muffin moulds.
The title is to be promoted in a $800,000 TV campaign starting on Wednesday July 20. The TV campaign includes spots on MasterChef.
Distributor Gordon and Gotch has been working with newsagents on the launch, to ensure good communication and to maximise sales for the title.
I urge newsagents to get behind this title. Contact Gordon and Gotch. Check your allocation. Lift it if you think it is too low.
My only concern is that Gotch is doing a split delivery. I have recommended against this but they see that they have little choice given the size of part 1.
Click here to go to the UK website for Baked & Delicious.
Why promote partworks?
I like partworks titles because they are habit based. They give us an opportunity to own the customer, to lock them in for repeat visits. Newsagency shopping baskets containing partworks are, on average, 33% bigger than shopping baskets not containing partworks. So, they are efficient. TV campaigns promote newsagencies. Newsagencies have historically been the only retail outlets with the titles.
You have almost convinced my to go into partworks again Mark.
Brace yourselves for the next 6 months of trying to track down back-orders, re-orders and being short supplied.
I would be quite interested in buying this series. I’ve been on to the website and found that there are 60 all told. In the UK, it’s possible to subscribe. My concern here in Australia is that the channel doesn’t have a good track record of reliable supply with part works. I’d be quite happy to have a putaway at my local newsagency but I don’t want to do so if it’s going to end up being a whole lot of hassle for them and for me with missing parts etc etc.
Mark – you’ve blogged in the past about problems with partworks. Do you have any reason for thinking that this one is going to be handled better?
Megan, The communication from the distributor this time is different and more engaged than I have ever seen. I expect newsagents to be able to fulfill the whole series.
I’m looking forward to Monday’s launch – I expect this to be a real winner.
Me too Tim. This is an exciting launch for us. Should be plenty of new traffic.
Did anyone else find it interesting that Megan blamed the channel for not having a good track record for partworks?
While newsagents bust their bums to get supply for its customers the dist. make it almost impossible to fill all orders.
But the customer see it as the newsagents fault, this is the main problem I have with partworks, while we get heaps of the first issue the supply dries up by issue 2-3 no matter what are sales data is like.
I hope that GG is not telling you porkies Mark and this time it will be different, but I think it may be like all the others.
I just down loaded mondays file and i seem to be getting just want i want with this part works , i am looking forward to doing up a display monday and giving it my best shot . I just hope they can provide future issues with out the normal bull that is part of the partworks game .