Newsagents need to have a structured approach to quitting stock left over from seasons or specially purchased offers, so that shelves do not become cluttered with remnants.
Once a range is done, because it does not sell or because it has run its race, we put it through a four-week cycle:
- The remaining stock is put in dump bins at 25% off.
- The dump bins are moved and marked down at 50%.
- The final price move is to a specific amount, $5, $2, $1 or even 50 cents demanding on the price of the item.
- The final move is to either give the remaining stock away or throw it away. The ideal is to find a local charity happy for what you don’t need.
Four weeks and we are done. There is no point keeping old stock hanging around. It wastes space, provides a conflicting message and can be frustrating when you walk past it.
Your newsagency software should be able to help you with all this.
I’d encourage newsagents to document their markdown and exit strategy and train all employees in this so that they can follow the policy without having to refer it to you. Building this into the operational structure of the business will provide certainty and free you to concentrate on more important business matters than stressing over when to quit a range which is at the end of its useful life in your business.
The more consistent we are on these things the better for our business and those who work in it.
I’d be interested to read what other newsagents do about this.
Our approach to old or dud stock is similar, but not one such a strict time schedule.
We start by moving the slow moving stock to various locations in the shop to see if it helps. This can include bringing it to the fore during our tourist season because if I’ve missed the mark with the locals, the it might appeal to a wider audience.
Then its marked down 25%; then a couple of times a year we have a sale table of bargain basement priced old stock. Being a small town, this can work best when we have tourists around, cause the locals usually snap them up at 25% off if it was a pricing issue, so the likely problem is I’ve bought in too much of the one thing and saturated my market.
If all else fails, when a local not for profit group wants donatio0ns to raffles etc, I “bring out the dead” and donate them.
Holding old stock was one of the biggest issues this newsagency had when we bought it. One of the first sales I had was when I got our longest serving staff member to go around the shop and collect anything that had been there longer than she could remember. Then we marked it down and got rid of it. The oldest things we found?… a candle snuffer that had been there for over ten years and a book that had been there for twelve!!!!