crosswords

Crossword magazine sales are up 6% year on year for us and while this is a terrific result compared to the channel average, we continue to embrace opportunities for more growth. Over the weekend, for example, we had four pockets space next to British magazines and so placed four crossword titles there. We did this because of observations of people purchasing British magazines often purchase crossword titles in the same transaction.

Data and observations can help us make better business decisions.

Our crossword sales are up 20% comparing the last eight weeks with the same eight weeks a year earlier. This is extraordinary growth outside what is average for the newsagency channel.

My research suggests that the average year on year growth for crosswords in 2.5%.

I’d put our growth down to moving the category to a better vertically integrated fixture and our discount voucher loyalty program. The discount voucher basket data in fact shows extraordinary use of the vouchers for crossword titles.

Newsagents can grow crossword magazine sales through more proactive shop floor engagement and a genuinely rewarding loyalty program.

The photo shows a prime location display of Lovatts puzzle titles on show yesterday at one of the WH Smith shops at Melbourne airport. Facing into the international terminal, it’s a strong pitch for Lovatts.

WH Smith purchased Wild Cards and Gifts as I mentioned on Monday. Newsagency style retail is their bread and butter. They are brand focused in their stores – as this Lovatts display shows.

I relayed the crossword section in a newsagency earlier this week to give greater prominence to Lovatts titles as the key brand in the crossword department and to use the AWW puzzle book as a border for the section.

The display before was a mess: Lovatts titles were sprinkled through and thereby missing an opportunity to promote the brand; the AWW puzzle book was lost; there was no order.

The display looked old and unappealing.

Blocking the titles, leveraging known brands and refreshing the offer shows the business taking pride in crossword titles. This will increase sales. Crossword magazine customers are loyal.

We are promoting Lovatts Holiday Crosswords on a floor display unit at the entrance to our main magazine aisle in our newsagency.

This high-profile placement is designed to boost sales for Lovatts Holiday Crosswords and to increase awareness of Lovatts crossword titles more broadly. Crosswords currently account for 5.37% of magazine sales and we are keen to increase this as crossword shoppers are habit shoppers and they are loyal.

This free standing floor display unit is very effective in driving impulse purchases of promoted titles. We have had to order more copies of Diabetic Living based on excellent sales last week from this same unit in this same location.

We have the display unit promoting Puzzler and Bauer crossword titles located just inside the entrance, appropriately next to our glasses unit.  While only in place a short time, we are certain this unit is driving sales of the promoted titles.

We are rich in traffic in newsagencies and sometimes the best way to drive sales growth it to promote products outside the usual location for those products. That’s certainly working here for us.

I like the stand. It uses a small footprint, is easy to move and holds a good range of product.

We are promoting AWW Puzzle Book 15 next to AWW as well as in our crossword section. But it’s this placement with AWW from where we will sell most copies.  This is because of our space commitment. It’s worth it to get good early sales … I’d say that most purchases are on impulse.

Newsagents should check where they have the puzzle book. Next to AWW is best in my view.

We are giving crosswords a run at the counter for the next week. While sales growth for the category has been good, we want more – hence this move. It’s very simple as the photo shows.

We are letting the titles speak for themselves as we have found this works best with crosswords. Putting the titles in the way of shoppers is the best way to drive incremental business.

I plan on leaving this display up for a week. We also have some crosswords with our weeklies as well as the usual crossword section.  Crosswords account for 8% of our magazine sales.

We have been promoting the New Idea Jumbo Puzzler title with newspapers this past week and it’s worked a treat. We also have the magazine with our crossword titles as well as a pocket with our week lines, sitting just above New Idea. I’d encourage newsagents to get this title into several locations. Some people who will purchase this title are not usual crossword purchasers – we have to chase them down.

We are promoting the launch issue of New Idea Jumbo Puzzler with placement next to New Idea in our weeklies section as well as prime placement in our crossword section.  This launch has hit at a good time with crossword sales strong in January as people take time off and look for things to occupy their time.

We were ready for this new title launch thanks to advance warning from publisher Pacific Magazines.  This enabled us to ensure that everyone on our team was ready to embrace the opportunity.

I also appreciate the scale out by Pacific on the title.  It’s not over the top. I certainly feel comfortable that we will be able to come close to selling out prior to the next issue in a month.

Our plan is that we will leave New Idea Jumbo Puzzler with New Idea this week and then promote it with newspapers next week. we know that our shoppers love crossword titles, they account for 9.43% of total magazine sales so I expect this new title to be an easy sell for us.

We refreshed our small crossword display on the weekend.  I’d left this since the magazine relay six weeks ago and found that a mixture of titles were being placed in this premium front-pocket space.  Most were overseas titles.  I early returned a bunch of under performing overseas crossword titles and allocated this prime space to Australian titles, as you can see in the photo.  This is in addition to two columns of space allocated to the Lovatts smaller format titles.

While I am happy to have overseas titles in the mix, they, like every other magazine, must pay their way per pocket.  Magazine distributors too often do not allocate with this goal for newsagents, especially when it comes to overseas crossword and puzzle titles.

So, our policy when it comes to crossword titles, is Australian titles first.  We will act sooner on poorly performing overseas titles.

Check out the display of crossword titles at one of the airport outlets.  I can understand why they do this – to get more stock per square metre of lettable space.  It’s all about return on rent.

In my experience, crossword shoppers will look for the titles which interest them.  It could be argued that for the regular crossword buyer, showing the full cover is not essential.  What this display challenges is the occasional crossword buyer who may pick up a title on impulse, based on the cover.

We are experimenting with this type of magazine display in a couple of special interest areas, where we receive few copies of a title, but not in Crosswords.

We have been running a promotion of Lovatts crossword and puzzle titles on an aisle end facing toward the front of the newsagency.  This display was setup to coincide with a magazine relay which resulted in all bar two small categories of magazines being moved.  Once the display comes down we will maintain a co-location strategy for crossword titles in with our women’s weeklies titles – the business driven from this additional placement is excellent.

The display in the photo, while simple, is effective.  we know from pocket counting that it is driving sales.