A blog on issues affecting Australia's newsagents, media and small business generally. More ...

Author: Mark Fletcher

Harry Potter partwork series launches

We have our 100 copies of part 1 of the new Harry Potter partwork series right at the front of the busiest entrance to our shop. We know from experience that a bold display with partworks works. I’d expect us to be ordering more stock tomorrow – just like we have twice with Felicity Wishes.

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Parts one and two of new partworks are impulse purchases, hence our decision to use prime real estate. They also allow us to boldly promote a product exclusive to newsagents which is backed by a strong TV campaign.

We’re confident about Harry Potter and early sales data supports that view.

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partworks

The newspaper front page

age_june06.jpgThis is the type of front page I want to see from The Age newspaper: clean and no barriers between me and the content on offer.

It’s what a newspaper is about – as opposed to having the brand damaged by the stuck on ads which the advertising people at Fairfax are pushing with advertisers.

I’m traveling so have taken the front page from The Age website.

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Newspapers

Emporium magazine a dud?

Emporium magazine, the vanity magazine from Myer and being sold through newsagents as a secondary channel appears to be a dud if the sales data I have seen is anything to go by. I am seeing sell through rates of 10% and less so far.

New titles are expensive for newsagents. We carry them on the shelves for, often, two months, only to find sales not as good as hoped – meaning we wait another month or two to claw back the returns value. We’re our of the cash for three or more months.

This is where a magazine czar could help us by controlling the titles which have access to our network.

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magazines

Calling in the Small Business Commissioner

We have lodged an application for investigation and mediation with the Small Business Commissioner of Victoria over the three and a half month disruption to our newsagency during major construction in and directly abutting our tenancy. The cost to us of lost trade and damaged stock from two floods is approaching $100,000. The Commissioner is charged with mediating disputes such as this in Victoria.

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Uncategorized

Selling Australia Post

post_june07.JPGThe government owned post office opposite my newsagency is leveraging their government guaranteed monopoly traffic to take more of my stationery sales.

The brochure released this week offers storage boxes, notebooks, lever arch files, calculators, Dymo label machines, fax rolls and other items newsagents have been known for. Now with the Government owned Australia Post pushing more into this space it’s getting tougher.

The actions of Australia Post say a lot for the small business credentials of the Federal Government. This ought to be an election year issue.

Australia Post, because of its brand and the low cost of landing customers in its corporate stores, has an unfair advantage with a business like mine. All I seek is a level playing field, fair competition.

It is time the Government held Australia Post to account and challenged their loose interpretation of the Act under which they operate.

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Australia Post

The Monthly is late

The Monthly is a good magazine but I can’t sell it if I don’t have the stock. The latest issue has been out two days already. Last month we received stock more than a week after publication. Newsagents need to receive stock on the day of publication so they can leverage off media interest.

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magazines

Tattslotto internet sales jackpot

tattersalls_online.JPGAt least one division 1 and six division 2 winners in Saturday night’s Lotto draw bought their tickets online.

I say “at least” because Tattersalls does not indicate if winners purchased online. The data I have is from the Golden Casket office. I wouldn’t be surprised if they stop publishing the number of prizes won through internet sales – especially if newsagents and other retail lottery agents step uyp their pressure against Tattersalls and other lottery businesses driving sales from the retail channel to online.

The belief in luck being what it is, the win on Saturday night will drive online lottery sales.

The graphic is from the Tattersalls website. There is no doubt about their desire to drive lottery sales online. As a lottery retailer, one who invests significant real-estate, labour and management time in supporting their brand, I’d prefer that they equally supported their retail network and offered a way for m to share in the mutual success of the online venture.

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Lotteries

Age newspaper masthead desecration

The Age newspaper today has another stuck on ad across the masthead on page one:

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Here is the damage caused by lifting the Commonwealth Bank Mastercard ad from the masthead:

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There are two slight tears along the lines of the adhesive. I can’t tell what Epicure “goes”. I can’t see the second person in the photo on the right.

There are not many professional newspaper people who would put advertising revenue ahead of their newspaper product in this way.

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newspaper masthead desecration

ANF Conference feedback

I spent this morning at the ANF Conference on the Gold Coast. Part of that time was delivering a presentation on using best practice IT to navigate to the newsagency of the future. The mood at the conference was upbeat with newsagents keen to talk about moves they are making in their businesses in pursuit of a brighter future.

Unfortunately I had to return to Melbourne this afternoon for a couple of important meetings. This is a crazy busy time at Tower Systems at present, which is great, and the day off between main ANF conference days is too much time away for me so I will fly back into the Gold Coast for my second presentation first thing Wednesday.

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Uncategorized

Newsagency of the future

I delivered the first of two workshops at the Australian Newsagents’ Federation’s Convention on the Gold Coast this morning. My topic was using best practice IT to navigate to the newsagency of the future.

Tom Carter, a newsagent in South Australia, was the first person I ever heard talk about the need for us to consider the newsagency of the future and that was years ago. The business he owns with his wife, June, is one of the examples in my presentation. I have blogged about it here before.

It seems to me that newsagents are like the deer staring in the headlights. Many are paralysed by fear of what they see in front of them. Newsagents know that newspaper sales are flat or falling, magazines the same, lotteries starting to move online and stationery sales being chased by every person and their dog.

While the bright lights of this reality stop most, there are some good examples of newsagents using technology to drive extraordinarily successful businesses. Rather than spending too long on a grand plan, these entrepreneurial newsagents are evolving their businesses today and with excellent success. In my presentation I talk about four businesses – yes there are plenty more than that – including June and Tom Carter’s newsagency in Adelaide.

Many newsagents, the ones staring at the headlights, are waiting for answered to be delivered to them. These are the newsagents most at risk.

The call to action of my presentation to the ANF Convention today and again on Wednesday is that the newsagency of the future is here, now, in our newsagencies and that all it takes is for us to use our IT systems – regardless of the brand – to cultivate data to guide our decisions.

The hour long presentation barely opens the door on consideration of the newsagency of the future. It’s likely I’ll develop an expanded presentation to share with newsagents elsewhere later this year.

Footnote: There are some who called on me to not attend the ANF convention because of the war between the ANF and the state newsagent associations in Queensland and New South Wales. I accepted the invitation from the ANF mid way through 2006, during a moment of peace, when I spoke at the QNF State Conference on a similar topic. Given the 1,400+ newsagents in the Tower Systems community, I felt it appropriate to accept the invitation and encourage newsagents to become more entrepreneurial.

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Newsagency challenges

10 obvious things about the future of newspapers

10 obvious things about the future of newspapers you need to get through your head is a blog post newsagents (Australian retailers and distributors of newspapers) must read. While it is written more for publishers, it goes to the heart of the newsagent challenge – embracing change in the distribution and retail of newspapers.

Too many newsagents are kidding themselves that the newspaper game will not change and that their businesses can motor on in bliss.

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Newsagency challenges

Newspaper masthead obscured (again)

GIO would have to be happy with obscuring The Age newspaper masthead today. It is a pity that Fairfax, publisher of The Age, rates ad revenue ahead of one of the most respected newspaper brands in the country.

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These stuck on ads create a trash problem around the stores where newspapers are sold.

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Newspapers

Should Australia Post be sold?

The Sydney Morning Herald website published a report late today saying Australia Post would be worth $7 billion if it were sold off. While I would like to see the Government get out of owning and running a retail chain, it would be inappropriate to sell the Australia Post government owned stores to a single big player who could easily leverage the monopoly backed brand into even tougher competition against newsagents.

Don’t misunderstand me – I am pro competition. But fair competition. Australia Post leverages its Government protected monopoly to land traffic in its own corporate stores for less than newsagents; they have moved in on newsagent stationery and other sales for a lower acquisition cost per customer; they have leveraged their Government footprint to an unfair lease, stock and conditions situation. If Australia Post were to compete fairly

The SMH says Australia Post’s community service obligations cold be a sticking point to any sale. I’d observe that Australia Post has paid scant regard to aspects of the legislation under which it operates so why start being concerned about these things now?

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Australia Post

Newsagents pitch stationery deals

We are actively supporting the newsXpress branded GNS Mid Year stationery sale with this display on the “dance floor” of our shop. Every customer walks past this. Note the stand we’re using right in front of the Reflex copy paper with the newsXpress branded catalogues.

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While the Mid Year Sale is available to all newsagents, our point of difference is the newsXpress branding and marketing group support. We have the GNS prepared catalogues (under newsXpress brand) plus we have backup support materials designed to drive sales – additional in store promotional strategies and exclusive marketing support.

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Stationery

Water and cards don’t mix

We had more flooding dramas on Friday as a result the construction going on in our shopping centre. This time the problem was right above our greeting card store room. Our entire backup stock was wiped out as well as new season stock. We are yet to hear from the landlord about compensation for the flood damage from two weeks ago and the resulting severe disruption to the business.

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Greeting Cards

International newspaper sales

newspaper_direct.JPGCatching up on my brief time in Thailand this week and came across this photo I took at Bangkok airport. It’s a stand right next to the counter. They print and bag current editions of international newspapers under the Newspaper Direct banner. It’s in an ideal location and in my brief time in the shop I saw three papers sold.

I’ve seen these Newspaper Direct stands plenty of times but the newspapers were not in sealed plastic bags like in Bangkok. It’s a good idea.

I know of a couple of Australian newsagents playing in this space – not sure how it’s going. For my money I prefer to connect with Australian news online when I travel – it’s more up to date and cheaper.

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Newspaper marketing

Life as a sub agent

BRW_rich_list.JPGI know that publishers are concerned about the increasing number of newsagents selling their home delivery business and retaining the retail operation. The concern arises from the changed relationship when the retail outlet moves to sub agent status. The key to retail only newsagents providing support on a par with when they were not sub agents lies in the management of the relationship by the supplying newsagent, the retailer and the publisher.

While I don’t like the promotions which seek to reduce my retail sales in favour of home delivery, I still participate. For example, yesterday we gave away a Herald Sun promotional bag with every Herald Sun sold. The goal of the promotion was to drive home delivery uptake.

Another example is the bold BRW display we have done to support the BRW Rich List special edition. The aisle end is a prime location and most sub agents would not give over such real-estate freely. We do because we see it as a way of demonstrating our relevance to titles which are in the news. So it’s a win win.

This issue of how to handle newsagents who become sub agents needs to be addressed at a high level between newsagents and publishers. It is increasing and some guidelines could avoid disputes and facilitate more the win win I am talking about.

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magazines

Ads before the newspaper masthead

The Age and Tattersalls are supporting their cross-promotion with an ad stuck on today’s newspaper masthead. So much for promoting the content of the newspaper.

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The continued use of these front page newspaper mast head ads demonstrates that editorial is not in control of the product.

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Newspaper marketing

Broadband, newspapers and sheep dags

Alan Mutter is, among other things, a blogger passionate about journalism and technology. I referred in a post yesterday to his post about the challenges to the newspaper model. Alan was in New Zealand in March and posted about the problems of poor and expensive broadband coverage. He also labels NZ newspaper websites as being from the 1990s.

If Alan Mutter were to visit Australia he would be even more critical of our broadband coverage. It is slow, expensive and patchy in its geographic spread. How we are expected to be competitive with such poor infrastructure is a question which must be asked of politicians. While it suits me as a retail newsagent because I will benefit from a slower migration online, I get the reality that news and information will shift online – it provides me with an opportunity to reinvent business.

Our politicians MUST fix the broadband mess and quickly. The cost to the economy of our businesses getting left behind because of poor broadband policy will be extraordinary.

What Mutter would like, I suspect, is our newspaper websites. The Fairfax offering is among the best in the world. News Ltd is catching up. Outside of these giants, we also have great sites such as Perth Norg showing what independents can do. Our sites are certainly better than those in New Zealand. We also have a robust online classifieds community including the Find It offering I am behind.

The news and information sites in Australia ought to be a motivator to newsagents to act on their own futures. For that to happen we need to collectively lift our heads out of the sand and see what is happening – slow broadband or not.

Alan also blogs eloquently and humorously about “dags“.

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Newsagency challenges

Tattersalls and The Age promote together

tattersalls_age.jpgThe Age and Tattersalls have banded together. Anyone purchasing a Tatts card gets a four week weekend subscription to The Age free.

As a retail only newsagent it is frustrating that I may lose some of my Saturday and Sunday sales of The Age. What is in this for me?

Since this promotion is really about boosting Tatts Card sales I’d like to see a robust reward for newsagency employees who make this campaign a success.

As the promotion currently stands I would not expect a big uptake. We will promote it through posters and brochures as required but the feeling among our team is that connecting The Age with Tattersalls products is not the best cross promotion they could run.

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Lotteries

Great ad foodland

Take a look at the brilliant full page ad Foodland ran in The Advertiser in Adelaide last week.

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We have run a similar but much smaller campaign across the counter of our newsXpress newsagency using flyers. The customer support against the behemoths of supermarkets, petrol outlets and c-stores is excellent. Australians want small businesses to thrive.

Newsagents ought to consider such a campaign promoting their retail channel. It’s not a new proposal. I put it forward in 2002 and had 150 newsagents offer support. None of the newsagent suppliers would get behind it nor did the associations at the time. Maybe it is time to revisit such a campaign. However, I suspect that this is now best executed at the marketing group level where discipline can be managed.

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Newsagency challenges

Newspaper front page advertising

The American Journalism Review has an good article by Donna Shaw about ore advertising getting onto the front pages of newspapers.

Page-one ads may net premium prices, but they’re distasteful to many journalists who believe they violate the purity of page one and the sacred wall between news and business. From a design standpoint, they can detract from the flow and order of a page. They also eat up space that otherwise could be devoted to stories, particularly in an era of dwindling newsholes.

I wonder what Shaw would make of the post-it type ads which Fairfax sticks on their mastheads here in Australia. These stuck on ads are more intrusive than front page ads.

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Newspapers
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