The future of newspapers
Eric Beecher, publisher of Crikey, and former editor of the Sydney Morning Herald, makes sense in his call for government investment in quality journalism.
While many newsagents may not care about the quality of newspapers, I see this as being an important issue for our channel. For more than 100 years we have been the specialists. Our specialisation has been developed around newspapers. Newspapers have been key to driving traffic to our doors. If newspapers soften and become even more about lifestyle than news, publishers are less likely to rely on specialist retailers to support the category.
One way we can reinforce our commitment to newspapers, beyond the marketing tips I published here a week back, is to embrace a broader specialist newspaper offer. By extending our range of foreign language newspapers we can tap into a growth segment of the newspaper category. In my recent sales benchmark study, foreign newspaper delivered double digit growth in many newsagencies – counter to the trend for capital city dailies. At our Forest Hill store they account for between 8% and 10% of total newspaper sales.
Another specialisation opportunity is around demographic specific newspapers. For example at our Forest Hill store we are proud supporters of the Melbourne Observer newspaper. This weekly generates sales of between 50 and 100 copies. Customers are as loyal as foreign language newspaper customers.
In these two examples, while we are not generating the volume of the capital city daily, we are serving a loyal constituency and thereby diluting the impact of any fall in sales of the dailies.
There are many conflicting views among commentators about the future of newspapers. A common view is that being local is key to the future. I see foreign language newspapers and titles like the Melbourne Observer fitting the local model. It is not difficult or expensive for newsagents to chase opportunities like these.