Here’s the front of one of my shops. The photo is from yesterday. It is deliberately open with products selected and placed to play against assumptions about newsagencies.
It’s working a treat.
Every day we make decisions in our shops about how we want our customers to see us, what they should expect from us. We do this through our product ranging, shop floor placement and social media pitches.
If we act traditionally, what we see through our register will be traditional. And, traditional is where plenty of newsagents are comfortable, which I respect. It’s not for me … hence the pitch you see in the photo.
Despite what we may think, we do have control over our businesses, what we carry, where it is displayed, how it is displayed, how it is priced and how we speak to it in-store. These are decisions we get to make, decisions that determine how shoppers see and interact with our businesses.
While we are part of a channel, the shops in the channel have become so diversified that there is no one model, no consistent pitch, except in an area under contractual control such as lotteries for those with that.
Now, on the displays … the tables you can see continuously evolve. There are major changes every two weeks and less major changes every few days. Oh, and in terms of the tables, we have eight positions like the in the photo inside the shop, each providing their own storytelling opportunity.
This space is called the dance floor, because of the never ending dance of movement of inventory and display fixtures.
I am grateful to the team members who have brought this latest offer alive. They have done a wonderful job.
Very nice. We need to educate the large shopping centre landlords .with the same.
This shop is in a Westfield centre in Melbourne with around 250 shops. The biggest challenge, beyond operating costs themselves, in a major shopping centre is the permitted use clause. This shop of mine is at the edge of what is permitted. I think we are given some leeway because the shop presents better than most similar retailers around us.
I’d point out that our approach with this shop is less is more. Rather than overloading with stock, we have less, at a higher price point. It’s working. It also helps that we were able to significantly reset our occupancy cost.
Yes looks very effective & inviting. Great and again very inviting positioning of the card display behind the giftware.
I agree the restrictive permitted use clauses for our channel are extremely frustrating and tend to pidgeon hole us into declining product categories. In my opinion these clauses are not sustainable for our businesses or for long term shopping centre tenancies. I am also puzzled why such protective clauses do not tend to be applied to new businesses competing in traditional newsagency product lines. Eg specialty greeting card stores, stationers such as Smiggles & Typo.
Terrific to hear of your success in negotiating reduced occupancy costs. I’m yet to see the same success up here with the large landlords still holding the pre COVID overinflated rent & indexation line.
Mark has referred to the reason we are all treated the same many times.
It’s all in the name.Mention Newsagent” in public and they say ‘they are finished” not what they used to be.
the last part is correct yhey are not yet we still stick with the name.
The publishershave two categories SPECIALIST NEWSAGENT- This is the one that does the Distribution and the other category is NEWS RETAILER- Two different contracts, in Metro Sydney it’s NEWS RETAILER- no mention of the word AGENT for they are not one. Rural is different in many areas, for the moment it suit both to do both.
newsXpress-Newspower, and Nextra all have name that do NOT include AGENT How refreshing long before the time.
How about the Local where some have converted to News and Gifts and Gifts ‘N” News -not very imaginative however it gets the message accross and is very effective in a retail sense.
Any ideas for a new Generic name for AGENT rather than re -seller or RETAILER ?
I would like to see this really develop for as you see how we Mark present his store above with excellent Social Expession for the Gift then the Card to fit plus Wrap. Looks great and very inviting which produces a “feel” for browsing and buying.
It’s anything and almost everything all but a newsagent yet it has News.