The VANA owned N-Stock is now promoting ink, just as you’d expect to see from a newsagency marketing group or a newsagency supplier. VANA and associations partnering with N-Stock is doing this at a time when they are asking the marketing groups and newsagency suppliers to help fund association activities. The associations supporting N-Stock can’t have it both ways – it can’t offer marketing group and or supplier products and services and expect other marketing groups to give it money for it to invest in developing its own marketing group services.
Association Directors supporting N-Stock need to sort our whether they are an industry association fearlessly and independently serving newsagent members first or a marketing group or a supplier, a commercial entity. It’s a choice that needs to be made. They can’t have it both ways.
Newsagent suppliers need to consider what they are supporting, whether they are supporting a competitor.
Now before any VANA director calls to complain about what I have said and to question my support for industry associations I’d say – man up, look at this as a supplier and consider your position in commercial terms. You can’t look at what you are doing as an association. That’s my point.
Footnote: In doing this VANA’s N-Stock is using the latest version of the industry owned N – I wonder if they are paying a royalty for that.
This is typical VANA, to be so far behind the curve. Ink has peaked. It won’t be long before it becomes yet another legacy product line. Ink wholesalers are likely seeing a decline in their other channels and VANA is a convenient “last chance cafe” for them to offload onto.
That said, you’re completely correct in your comments about VANA and it’s identity crisis. It’s so useless in its role as an industry representative that it tries to make it self appear useful by frittering around the edges of marketing/ buying activities.
For example, 100s of newsagents made business critical decisions based on T2020 being promoted (by VANA) as the future of the trade. Since the announcement of the T2020 failure what have they done about driving the future of voluntary consolidation ?
We should compare ourselves with the Taxi industry and look at what the Taxi associations are doing to influence the systemic changes confronting their business model.
A bit of vocal activism would be far more useful than some cut price ink.