There is no evidence in our sales data going back three months for Bauer Media increasing supply of Yours magazine by 5%. IIt is increases like this that demonstrate sending data back through XchangeIT is a waste of time. For all their bluster against newsagents and data, XchangeIT should look closer to home for misbehaviour with data.
FFS Bauer why can’t you get your allocations right?!
My understanding of the XchangeIT platform is that it is supposed to be a two way street with retailers sending data to distributors who then presumably pass sales data to publishers and in return we get timely electronic invoicing. Obviously the distributors are not getting sales data to publishers in a timely manner (if the publishers are to be believed) and probably never will given the cock-eyed distribution model we have to live with where it suits the distributors down to the ground to have massive numbers to distribute.
Electronic invoicing is something which could be achieved just as well using email just as many other suppliers do so it really begs the question – why do we bother with XchangeIT?
Come to think of it, why couldn’t sales data be sent automatically via email as well?
I am firmly of the belief that retailers are being ripped off by XchangeIT in that we should be paid properly for supplying sales data (just as supermarkets are) and that the piddling discount on XchangeIT charges one gets for supplying daily sales is insulting.
Unfortunately, the monkeys pulling the allocation levers in NDC and G&G are doing just what the model says they should do!
Jim XchangeIT should be as tough on compliance against those in control of allocations as they are with newsagents. Unfortunately they are not as they are owned and controlled by distributors.
We are being ripped inn too often by those in control of allocations who arrogantly disregard our business data.
XchangeIT should be as tough on compliance against those in control of allocations as they are with newsagents. Unfortunately they are not as they are owned and controlled by distributors.
This is my point Mark – XchangeIT is of little real value to retailers given the way it is misused by distributors. It just seems to be another way of gouging money from us for little return.
The distributors should be able to send data to publishers on a daily basis (if that’s what they want). All this crap about needing to aggregate and cleanse data is nonsense and the XchangeIT platform adds no value to the exercise in that it would be just as easy to analyse a file sent via email as it would be if sent via XchangeIT. I worked for a major food manufacturer years ago dealing with the large supermarkets and the tools were there then for receiving sales data daily via email – and it worked well! then just as it would now.
As for the allocations people – it would seem that the major requirement for this job would be the ability to use the percentage button on a pocket calculator – they obviously don’t use sales data and just divvy up whatever the publishers send them.
Mark couldn’t you pool the sales and return data of say 100 tower agents to provide (publicly accessible) data for each issue of each title? Have a link from this website and make publishers aware they can access real time data on their title’s performance. If a publisher could see that, for example, 60% of the stock that they sent out that morning has been early returned and never made it onto shelves, I would expect change.
Data fields I would envisage:
title/issue/on sale date
no of stores
total no of mags distributed
sales by day/ total
early returns by day/ total
could add secondary fields like
performance pass/fail
(profitable/unprofitable)
average sales per store
(vs average supply per store)
Many agents would be happy to provide their data (perhaps an automated email as part of end of shift each day). Could also pass around the hat for development costs!
We could call it TransparentChangeIT.
I’d be happy to participate.
Cameron yes. The only thing stopping it is my understanding of the contracts and data sharing at a title level.
Would it matter? Bauer knows they oversupply. They clearly don’t care.
bauer do care, thats why they do it, they are doing what they need to do to make money, ie oversupply. Its the publishers and retailers that cant find away around the problem
It’s a pointless war that no one will win.
They over supply and we early return.
What amazes me is how much crap GG distributes from overseas.
Yes there are some great magazines that sell but there’s a hell of a lot more that doesn’t!