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Management tip

No reason to discount Christmas cards right now

boxedxmasI heard of a newsagency discounting boxed Christmas cards this week – buy one and get the second pack for 50% off. This is nuts in my view for a couple of reasons: boxed Christmas cards sell easily right now without discounting and if you are trying to drive loyalty then use a whole of business loyalty approach like discount vouchers or, groan, a points-based loyalty program.

Okay giving the second box of cards at half price may drive sales. I know in my own newsagencies it would not be useful since 73% of boxed card purchases are two or more boxes. Why would I discount for a volume purchase I would get regardless?

I suspect the newsagents running this promotion will find themselves discounting sales they would have got anyway.

It’s vitally important that discounting has a business purpose, that it results in purchases you would otherwise not have achieved. Structured discounting, beyond that to move dead stock, needs to be well thought through with justification deep within your business data. Doing it on a whim, based on gut feel or because you’re told to will more likely result in your giving away margin you need not give away.

The discount voucher approach, of a cash off the next purchase via a voucher printed on the receipt, is a whole of business approach. In my newsagency where we have been doing this since February, more than half the vouchers issues for greeting card purchases result in redemption purchases in other departments. It’s important we promote our whole business and not just isolated categories.

I’d encourage newsagents to think carefully before they run a Christmas card discount like the one I have described. Sure they will feel they are getting good sales. I suspect a review of business data will show they are unnecessarily giving away margin dollars. There’s no sense in that.

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Management tip

Just read: How the Mighty Fall by Jim Collins

howthemightyfallHow the Mighty Fall is a good book to read if you want to understand how successful businesses have missed opportunities and ultimately failed. The case studies are quite detailed. You get to the moment of failure, the opportunity lost.

Jim Collins explains why good companies fall and how leaders react. I found it fascinating and relevant.

This book is relevant to newsagents because of its coverage of businesses dealing with disruption to their traditional model – like we are. The big business examples are relevant because the challenges are common to us.

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Management tip

How to get the wrap sale with Christmas boxed cards

xxnaf99Here’s another success store for the discount vouchers we have now been running since February. Yesterday, a customer purchased two boxes of boxed Christmas cards. On receiving a voucher offering $2.00 off their next purchase, they went and selected a roll of Christmas wrap. This customer is not a regular. They didn’t want to miss out on saving $2.00. Over the two purchases we gave away just under 7% of a total spend of $26.00. I’m happy with that. their reaction tells me they will tell others.

A points-based loyalty offer would not have worked in this situation – because the shopper is not regular and because the value of points is not as obvious as a $$$ amount on a coupon.

Our card sales are up 12% year on year in this store and I think this is in part due to the discount vouchers program.

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Management tip

Sunday newsagency management tip: use a pre-interview call to screen employee candidates

For years I have screened job applicants with an unscheduled pre-interview phone call. This has helped me eliminate candidates from further consideration.

I usually all saying that we have a ton of applicants and am screening them for a bit more information before deciding on the shortlist. I ask them to tell me more about themselves beyond what’s in their application and why they applied to us for work with us. These two questions are usually all I need to either confidently move to the next step or to eliminate a candidate from further consideration.

In retail we need people who are attentive and can engage with people they have never met before. While some may be uncomfortable on the phone, I think a call is a fair part of candidate assessment.

I have eliminated many candidates who didn’t know they had applied to work in a newsagency. One guy said I just clicked apply on every retail job I could find, I didn’t read the ads – and I didn’t consider him any further. I have eliminated others who had dreadful phone manner – sometimes there are so many applicants that you need even the slimmest excuse to cull someone from the pool.

I often follow up the two questions with a comment that we’ll do a police check if they get through the interview. I think this is the reason I sometimes receive an email following the call saying they have found a job elsewhere.

These pre-interview calls have helped boost candidates to the top of consideration because of their attentiveness and engagement in the call. What I love the most about the calls is their unpredictability. Since they are not scheduled and are unexpected to the recipient, they can go in any direction. I’ve found this to be a terrific help in finding people appropriate to the demands of a newsagency business.

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Management tip

Sunday newsagency management tip: embrace the truth of your situation

It’s easy to whip newsagents into a frenzy about magazine supply, lottery competition or late newspapers but almost impossible to achieve the same attention and comment about employee theft, poor business planning or falling stationery sales.

I am concerned that as a channel we like to complain about the parts of our businesses over which we have the least control while ignoring opportunities to complain about ourselves and our poor stewardship of those parts of our businesses over which we have the most control.

The data reported by our computer systems tell us the truth. They tell us how stationery, gift, toy, card and other sales are year on year. yes, I include cards in this list over which we have control because it’s time newsagents realised that they have more influence over their card sales than their supplier.

My management challenge to newsagents today is – next time you are about to criticise a supplier, pays and think whether you hold your own performance over your business to the same standard. Look at your year on year business data. It won’t lie. If your stationery, gift, card, toy and plush sales are down it’s 100% on you. If magazine, newspaper, lottery and agency sales are down, you;re playing a role in that decline.

Embrace the truth of your data and use it to guide where you need to focus your attention.

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Management tip

Sunday newsagency management tip: sales ratios to measure your business by

I have developed sales ratio benchmarks newsagents can use to determine what they can achieve in their businesses. I use these in turnaround situations to show an old-school newsagent what they can achieve using data from their traditional business to pivot to a more relevant newsagency business.

These sales ratio benchmarks are different to stock turn and profit guide benchmarks. These sales ratio benchmarks are designed as a minimum achievement guide only. Many newsagencies are performing far better than these:

  1. Gifts to cards: 33%. If your card sales are, say, $100,000 a year. You should be able to achieve $33,000 in gift sales.
  2. Plush to cards: 25%.
  3. Pens to stationery: 33%.
  4. Ink to stationery: 50%.

These benchmarks do not mean that gift sales are recorded as cards or that ink is recorded as stationery or that plus is part of cards. No, they are all in separate departments: ink, gifts and plush. The percentage is a comparative guide. That said, pens, of course, are in stationery – that is the only exception.

On gifts to cards, I know of newsagencies where gift sales are greater than cards and gifts generate more traffic and through this actually drive card sales.

Plush is the ratio I am challenges most on. It’s important to approach plush as not soft toys you sell for young kids. Plush can be sold for anyone of any age. You are not your customer.

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Management tip

Sunday newsagency management tip: use your newsagency software to help cut theft

Further to my post a week ago about detecting theft, here is advice on reducing theft using your newsagency software.

Used properly, good Newsagency software can significantly cut the cost of theft.

Theft reduction is achieved through consistent use of the software throughout the business. The less consistent a business the less likely they are to uncover theft. Those most likely to steal will notice how the software is used and through this reach a conclusion as to the likelihood they will be caught.

Tracking stock from when it enters a business to when it leaves is the key to detecting and reducing theft by employees and customers. Too often, small and independent retailers do not fully track and manage stock – making them appealing businesses for people likely to steal.

Here are the steps involved in tracking stock and reducing the cost of theft:

  1. Enter all incoming stock into your POS software. Include the quantity received to ensure that the current quantity on hand is accurate.
  2. Write off stock that is thrown away.
  3. Scan-out all stock that is returned to the supplier for any reason. Good software will have
  4. Sell items by scanning the barcode. Too often items are sold using department keys and therefore not tracking each specific item sold.
  5. Reorder stock by producing a reorder report using your software. This can usually be done by using a desired quantity on hand as the guide for the software to reorder to. Note: this process alone will highlight stock on-hand discrepancies.
  6. Undertake a spot stock-take: count the quantity on hand of an item and enter that into your POS software and compare this against what the software thinks should be on-hand. A discrepancy can indicate theft.

Once all stock is setup in your software, the time taken for spot stock-takes is minimal. This time is funded from the reduced theft that will certainly result.

Employees who see you track stock movement through spot stock-takes and other activities listed here will be deterred from stealing from the business as they will see the risk of being caught is higher.

Manage your business professionally and consistently and theft will cost less.

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Management tip

Sunday newsagency marketing tip: open another ‘shop’ away from your shop

Next time there is a market near your newsagency, book a market stall and promote some of what you sell in your shop at a stall at the market. Even a car boot market would work. But be sure to brand the stall to promote your shop.

If your experience is like others I have spoken to you’ll have some regular customers buying items from the stall and saying you should sell these in your shop. Rather than being frustrated by such a comment, take it as advice that you need to find a way to cut through with product displays and placement.

Another option is to book a local hall and create your own market situation. In the run up to Christmas you could create a pop-up shop and run this for,say, a week – offering great Christmas gifts at bargain prices. Just taking some of what you currently sell and adding to this with extra stock you would most likely find that you can maintain an excellent margin.

While there is a bit of work organising a second temporary location, done well the reward should be worth it.

Shopping centre based newsagents have plenty of opportunities for outposts. While they can be excellent, my marketing tip this week is to break free from being out the front or close to your shop. The goal is to find genuinely new shoppers.

Footnote: one newsagent doing this a few years back found another stall holder selling products stolen from the newsagency. So, you never know what you’ll find when you get outside your shop and look around.

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Management tip

Sunday newsagency management tip: make sure your accountant understand the newsagency business

I have been working with a couple of newsagents recently to help them each get to an accurate P&L and Balance Sheet so they can sell their business. I’ve had the help of a qualified accountant who has experience doing the accounts for several newsagency businesses. In each case, the accountants used by the newsagents charged too much to produce financials that are inaccurate and cannot be used in the sale of the business. In one case their accountant wanted to charge thousands to fix the botched job.

It’s important to choose an accountant who understands the nature of your newsagency business. Recommendation from a newsagent you trust would be a good guide in my view. Choosing an accountant because they are local could lead to your business being poorly served as has happened to these two businesses I have been working with.

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Management tip

Brands key to driving new traffic

We have a spinner packed with Peppa Pig product on our lease line as I have noted here previously. On Saturday I saw the importance of this stand in attracting shoppers to the business who might otherwise not have shopped with us.

Standing outside the newsagency I watched as a young girl dragged mum, dad and an older sister to look at Peppa. She pointed to the sign on top of the spinner. She bought a Peppa and the older sister bought another plush item. The parents bought two greeting cards.

Sometimes we don’t need a big billboard display to attract shoppers. Sometimes, easy to see well-located placement of a recognisable brand can attract traffic that otherwise you may not have attracted.

Footnote: our discount vouchers helped us maximise the opportunity from this family. Total spend was in excess of $35. The team working in this newsagency created this success for us.

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Brand retailing

Sunday newsagency management tip: remove people who don’t support your plans

If you have people working in your newsagency who disagree with the direction of the business and or changes you are making then you need to act. Either they wholeheartedly support your moves or they go. Having people remain working for you when they disagree with what you are doing can harm the business and distract from the changes you want made.

It’s one thing to have a robust debate about changes you may make and another entirely to face disruptive challenges to every move you make.

I was talking to a relatively new newsagent this week (they’re six months in) about the challenges of a long-term employee of the business who questions almost every move they make, complains about them behind their back and even undoes changes on the weekend if the owners are away. I told them to issue a written warning to the full-time employee with a view to termination if their behaviour does not change.

The employee in this business was being passive-agressive to the new owner and exerting more control over the business than they should. Given that the business has less that 15 employees the owner has options for a faster resolution of what is a toxic situation.

Newsagents need to act as the owners they are. They need to lead the business and run it from a position of authority.

While I welcome debate about change in any business I own, once a decision is made I expect 100% support from all team members.

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Management tip

Sunday newsagency management tip: take control of your magazines

Magazine supply is regarded by newsagents in Australia as the single most important issue to resolve yet many newsagents to not use the tools at their disposal to take on the challenge.

Good newsagency software offers magazine management reports covering:

  • Magazine Sell Through Rates.
  • Supplier Performance Comparison.
  • Magazine Cash-Flow Performance.
  • Non-Performing Titles.
  • MPA Magazine Performance Tracking.

These reports and others arm newsagents with evidence of magazine oversupply and undersupply yet newsagents rarely reach for the reports when they complain about magazine supply. Instead, they rely on a cash-flow challenge indicating the problem or they rely on the work they see on the mornings of processing magazines into the business.

By not relying on magazine oversupply and undersupply evidence newsagents are not resourced to put their case and this, I think, is one reason nothing has been done about the treatment of newsagents in relation to magazine supply for decades.

Ignorance among newsagents and associations facilitates magazine oversupply and undersupply.

No association or newsagent has used reliable data to make the case in an appropriate forum to my knowledge. Why? Because they are ignorant or they think it’s too hard or both.

Any newsagent running good newsagency software can, in next to no time, document the fairness of supply of magazines to their business. This documentation could be invaluable in making a case to an appropriate forum through which real change could be required of any offending magazine distributor.

Taking action on magazine supply begins with newsagents using accurate data from their business. Individual newsagents and the channel more widely must treat this as a management issue if they want it resolved.

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magazine distribution

Maximising margin in your newsagency

I have seen several situations recently where newsagents have been able to increase the price of popular products without any adverse effect on the volume sold.

In one case the newsagent increase the price of a range of plush from $7.95 to $9.95, in another they increased their cardboard price from $1.50 to $2.20 and in another they increased the price of a popular counter line from $4.40 to $4.95.

In the newsagency where they increased the selling price of cardboard they have added at least $3,640 to their bottom line in a full year as a result of their price move. No extra work, no lost sales – just extra profit.

My question for newsagents reading this is: what prices could you increase without impacting sales volume? If there are items then do it! The ideal items are those others cannot easily purchase elsewhere.

This is not something to procrastinate about. In fact, the timing right now is ideal with the lower exchange rate and rising labour and rent costs you have justification for increasing prices.

So, what prices could you increase without impacting sales volume?

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Management tip

Stock turn benchmarks for an average newsagency

I am often asked for my thoughts on stock turn benchmarks for a newsagency. The list below is what I use as a guide when assessing a business. While there are some differences between city and country as well as between high street and shopping centre, these numbers are a good guide as to the minimum turn.

  1. Stationery : 7.0.
  2. Tobacco : 12.0.
  3. Gifts: 6.5.
  4. Plush: 8.0.
  5. Cards: 3.5.

Stock turn (or inventory turnover as it is known in some places) is a good measure in retail. I find it useful when assessing a business restructure. It guides space and stock investment allocation targeting an overall business goal. It’s a measure that an draw attention to an inefficient department or category of inventory.

The faster you turn stock the better.

It is easy to blame your supplier of under-performing stock or the stock itself. Retailers need to take responsibility in my view and work stock hard with ideal placement, appropriate product adjacencies, good staff training and excellent in-store and external promotion.

Most newsagency businesses I see that are not performing well have a low stock turn. One of the best ways to address this is to order stock using your computer system, based on accurate sales data. Too many newsagents complain that this is too hard. While hard work may be involved initially, this will cost the business less than the poor decisions of not ordering based in reliable business data.

Dead stock costs more than the money spent on the stock. There are space, labour and opportunity costs to consider.

Newsagents can compare their performance through reporting in their newsagency software or they can do a rough manual calculation.

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Management tip

Sunday newsagency management tip: take your end of shift seriously

It frustrates me the number of newsagents I speak with who say their staff have trouble balancing at the end of shift yet they take no action to rectify the situation. I am usually met with a shrug of the shoulders and what can I do? question.

What you can do is provide leadership for your newsagency by respecting cash for what it is, the lifeblood of the business.

If your end of shift is not balancing here is what I suggest you do:

  1. Establish rules. Be clear in what is acceptable. I’d suggest $5.00 over or under as the boundaries.
  2. Outline what you expect. If the balance is outside the rules, put in writing what is to be done and demand that this is followed.
  3. Act on people who fail. From failing to balance to causing, during the day, problems for the end of shift. You want the best people working for you.
  4. Train. make sure your people have the skills to behave as you want.
  5. Enlist help. Call your newsagency software company and ask them to review your data. Not balancing may be because of misuse of the software. It may also be due to employee theft. No matter what the cause, your software supplier ought to be able to help you with a plan of action for your specific situation.

Balancing at your end of shift is a serious matter. Ignore it and the cost to your business could be considerably more than the few dollars you appear to be out every day or so.

I was working with a newsagency recently where one employee offered up different excuses a couple of times a week for the cash being out. Over time the pattern showed they were either stupid or stealing. Either way, the only option for the business was to cut their hours.

This is serious.

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Management tip

Newsagency management tip: quit stock seriously

Harmony Bracelets have not worked for us. While we have sold 35% of our stock, the rest has sat for close to two months. This morning I made the decision to get out of the remaining stock this weekend and put the $9.95 bracelets on sale at $1.00.  Now, less than three hours in they’re selling very well. We should be done by the end of tomorrow. This frees floorspace for us, giving us an opportunity for a new product story.

Too often I see newsagents hold onto product for the sake of hoped-for margin in the future rather than discounting and taking the cash today. Okay so we have lost money on the bracelets. The loss I am realising today is less, I suspect, than the loss because of non-performing product taking up floorspace.

You can’t bank margin from products that don’t sell.

So, when I decide to quit an item I set pricing for it ti actually sell out.  The usual starting point is between 33% and 50% off. next is 75% and finally we move to a $$ price point. In the case of the Harmony Bracelets, their recent performance was such that I felt I needed to go straight to the $$ price point. hence the $1.00 price. It is also helping that school holidays have just started.

One customer bought 14 bracelets.

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Management tip

Business performance analysis for a traditional newsagency

I was asked to look at the performance data for what I’d call a traditional newsagency recently. As the following brief report shows, this is an older-style newsagency dominated by lottery sales. The sales mix is very concerning as too higher a percentage of income is coming from one source.

I have looked at your Monthly Sales Comparison Report for April through July 2013 compared to the same period in 2012.

I can see from the data that the business is struggling. Your main traffic generator is lotteries, accounting for 61.76% of your traffic. As lottery sales migrate online your situation puts you at risk as you’re not generating traffic for any other significant product line.

You need to act urgently to repurpose the business. The easy route would be to play in the convenience / agency space. The problem with this is that it’s nothing special and nothing you control as your own. With Australia Post nearby and offering high tech solutions in parcels, bill payment and other areas, I can’t see how you can compete with their mature and nationally marketed offer.

Once I strip out lotteries, dry cleaning classified ads and instant scratch ticket sales, you’re at $5,550 in sales. If I take out low margin and falling (at 16% YOY) tobacco sales you’re well below $5,000 a week.

I think you would be better off creating a pint of difference around other opportunities. For example, your data shows several opportunities I’d be interested in if I were you:

  1. Magazines. Motoring titles account for 13.28% of sales and sport at 6.9%. So, your shop has a reasonable male shopper skew. What gifts do you offer for males? I can’t tell because your gift sales data does not provide this detail. Women’s Weeklies magazines account for 23.8% of total magazine sales. Are you catering to women in your gift offer?
  2. Stationery. You’re doing $250 a week in stationery sales. If you have more than $3,000 invested in stationery stock then you;re grossly under-performing in this space.

Your business, in the data, looks like an old style newsagency, one that was built i the day of regulation and tradition. It’s time for you to break free and be a retailer exerting control over the business. You have to stand for something other than lotteries and magazines, something extra to generate net new traffic for you. the question is what is that? What can you offer that will bring shoppers to your business?

I can see you dabbling in gifts at $150 a week in sales. What’s working, what are the expansion opportunities.

You will do far better attracting shoppers for gifts and other items at 50% and more GP than if you focus on agent type business that earns you far less and relies on others to generate traffic for you.

The biggest challenge is whether you want to take control of the business, to break free from being a shopkeeper and becoming a retailer with a business plan. It’s hard work. I’ve seen it succeed in the most unlikely situations. The key is to engage aggressively targeting your goals and not what others say your goals should be.

Your data suggests that you need to act with urgency.

While I’d rather write a more positive report, this could become positive if the owner recasts the business to generate traffic for themselves, from their own initiatives and in pursuit of better margin. I understand how hard this is and that such a change takes cash and time. However the challenges of today’s newsagency are not unexpected.

For decades our channel was protected and we could get away with being average and with others generating traffic for us. Today’s reality is that our further in each of our businesses is 100% up to us.

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Management tip

Sunday newsagency management advice: take control of your pen range, chase sales growth

This photo shows a pen wall in a newsagency I was in recently. The pen offer in this high-street newsagency is less than ideal: much of the stock is old, the fixtures are vey old and the overall offer unappealing. There is no story being told, no pride being shown.

Get pens right and they account for around 33% of all stationery sales and they deliver year on year growth of between 5% and 10%.

Getting pens right means having a good range of current stock fixtured in clean and fresh units well signed and in a location noticed by most who shop in the newsagency.

It’s not hard work to get pens right but it does mean exerting control: controlling what is ordered, how it is displayed and how it is sold. Suppliers make it easy by providing reps who will order for newsagents. This can be a bad move.

My Sunday newsagency management tip today: look at your pen offer and take control. Expect sales to increase.

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Management tip

Sunday newsagency management tip: balance shopper traffic across product categories for a stronger future

Key to achieving the best possible gross profit for a newsagency is balancing the reasons shoppers visit your retail business, balancing the products that attract them.

By balancing I mean making sure you attract shoppers across a range of products and product categories and not relying on one or two. Relying on one or two such as magazines, transport tickets or lotteries means you suffer more if they suffer.

Also, the more shoppers visiting for low margin agency and circulation product lines the harder it will be to reach above the average gross profit range of 28% to 32%.

If, on the other hand, you can attract shopper traffic for higher margin lines like gifts, greeting cards, plush and stationery then you’re better positioned reach above the gross profit average. Attracting shoppers for more products and categories, too, balances your business and insulates you against a downturn in one category.

The question is how do you do this, how do you attract new shoppers for the destination items? It does not happen by putting some of these higher margin products on the shelves or a floor display unit. No, you need to make a statement, you need to show off your business as being a specialist in the area. This is achieved with range, in-window or front of store display and external marketing.

Reach outside your comfort zone with what you sell and out of your shop in promoting this – to reach new customers and thereby drive a better gross profit outcome for your business. Be guided by the gross profit you want to achieve. The current industry average of 28% to 32% is too low. Our entry point target should be 40% but with magazines at 25% and newspapers often at below 20%, we need traffic for gifts (55%+, plush 55%+, stationery 50% and cards 60%+ to get to the overall 40%.

While I see this as basic retail management, to some newsagents it will seem like hard work – getting the products, displaying them to attract new shoppers and promoting outside your four walls.

Achieving above average gross product requires above average effort. It’s worth it.

Why does this matter? Traffic for low margin traditional newsagency lines is falling, what are you doing about it?

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Management tip

Sunday newsagency marketing tip: watch the heads of your shoppers as they enter and shop your shop

I love watching customers in a newsagency, from when they enter the shop to where they go and, more important where they look. I watch their heads to see what they notice, where they turn. I learn plenty from being a voyeur.

In one newsagency I was working with recently shoppers tended to enter and look down at the flat stack of magazines. This was a surprise to the owners since they focused their attention on the top pockets of their magazine fixture. Magazine sales were consistently below the industry average.  Changing their focus to building from the flat up drove an immediate sales lift – all because we followed where the customers were looking. While this is not the only reason for below average magazine sales, it was a factor, one to address.

Watching where your customers look and taking note of what draws their attention can be instructive. Major retailers can do with the technology tools. We in small business need to live with personal observation. And that’s my marketing tip today – watch your customers, learn what they notice. Do more of that.

How’s this a marketing tip? Tune your business more to what interests your existing customers and you will sell more.

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Management tip

Sunday newsagency management tip: let your employees make mistakes

Learning from mistakes can be more valuable than formal training. That’s been my experience. Too often I see newsagents micro-managing their employees and denying them the opportunity of learning from mistakes.

A young employee just given responsibility for an area of a newsagency had made some excellent choices in changing product layout.The changes they had made were a vast improvement. I witnessed the owner of the business ignore the opportunity to compliment and point out where they could do better. This same owner has a track record of micro-managing employees, managing away their creativity and not tolerating any mistake.

While the young employee in the above story could have done a better job, this was their first crack. I am certain they will improve with time based on their initial work. If I was the owner I’d have congratulated them and left it at that. Good people improve of their own accord. They also make some mistakes and these are be more valuable for them and us.

I’d go as far as to suggest we need to encourage mistakes – as long as the people working with and for us learn from them. We need to learn from our own mistakes. In fact, it’s good to show off to ur colleagues that we do this.

I’ve made plenty of mistakes in my years in business. The best mistakes are those people have seen me make and see me learn from. These are the mistakes that have been more valuable for me too.

This is my management tip today: don’t micro manage, set your people free and welcome mistakes by those who will learn from them.

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Management tip

Sunday newsagency management tip: choose how you spend your time

Newsagents are time poor. This statement is made too often and it is rarely challenged. I think we need to challenge it – if only to think before we spend our time doing something.

I see newsagents doing things like ordering stock manually that they could do in a more automated way. I see newsagents running a business with full time management overhead which not be the case if owned by a big business operator. I see newsagents work from offices that are a hoarders dream more so than an efficient and organised office.

We can choose to NOT be time poor. Now before you say I have no idea what I talking about, consider what you do in an average day if you’re 100% in your newsagency. List down every single thing you do. I did this recently with a newsagent, they kept a notepad in their pocket. When we reviewed the list a day later they agreed that they could cut a third of what they do by delegation and close to another third by saying NO, I WON’T DO THAT. Yes, we need to say no to some things we do today, things that if they are not done the business will not be hurt.

For example, cut the time you spend with reps. If the relationship makes you money – sure see them. If it’s not making you money, cut it off. In another newsagency where I had this discussion the owners listed six rep visits a month they could cut. Will they? I suspect not. Should they? yes … because they say they are time poor.

In another example, consider outsourcing tasks that are more efficiently handled outside the business. I know a newsagent who uses an external bookkeeper. This provides another set of eyes on the business, keeps them on top of paperwork and frees the office / back room time for more productive work. yes there is a small cost but once they looked at it it was cheaper to use a bookkeeper than twice or three times the time for the owner to do the work in the shop or at home.

We can all make choices to stop busy work or work better handled in another way. We can have more time for work that matters in our newsagencies. We can make the decision to not be time poor.

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Management tip

How I’m growing magazine sales 10% year on year

A check of year on year sales at one of my newsagencies shows that we’re achieving 10% year on year unit sales growth for magazines and even more at some category, segment and title levels.

Woman’s Day sales are up 6%, New Idea up 15%, Who 31%, Take 5 up 7%, TV Week up 7.8%, AWW up 4.5% and craft overall up 40% off a good base. While magazine sales are challenged for many, things are working well for us. Here is what we do to drive magazine sales:

  1. We obsess about the category because it’s a key traffic driver. We manage it as a point of difference and not as an obligation. By obsess I mean that more than 50% of my time in the shop is spent on magazines.
  2. We react to covers. I topical cover gets extra attention.
  3. We regularly relay magazine categories and titles to keep the layout fresh and relevant. For example, we moved craft from deep in the women’s section to be opposite our weeklies. Bam! Sales went nuts.
  4. We co-locate titles to chase impulse purchases. For example, That’s Life puzzle titles with That’s Life and the AWW crossword book with AWW. Anyone reading my recent posts will know this one move is driving double digit year on year growth.
  5. We often promote magazines on the lease line to passers-by – sometimes weeklies, other times categories.
  6. We use smaller format in-locations displays more so than the publisher preferred billboard displays.
  7. We reward genuinely loyal shoppers for above average behaviour. There is no doubt that the discount vouchers facility is driving good growth for us. Every day we see shoppers purchasing a magazine on impulse as a result of a cash discount opportunity we give them.

I don’t mean to sound big-headed but to me it’s these initiatives publishers should be promoting to newsagents. Our channel can grow magazine sales if we all engage in the kind of activity noted above.

The most important reward any newsagent can win is sales growth. We all must chase this for magazines as this product category continues to be very important to our businesses despite the sales declines reported in many newsagencies.

I’d be happy to help any newsagent address magazine sales challenges.

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magazine distribution

Sunday newsagency management tip: wake up, you’re in retail!

I visited a newsagency yesterday to purchase a stationery item and when I approached the counter with the item I wanted, around two minutes after I entered the shop, the person sitting on a stool at the counter was startled.

I didn’t see you come in they said.  That’s because you were too busy on your phone you lazy sod is what I should have said instead of just smiling. I paid, they gave me change and that was it. I turned back to check as I exited and they were on their phone again. The whole time they did not leave the stool.

The person who served me be would be in their early twenties and earning over $21 an hour to work. In the US this person would be lucky to be on $8 an hour and for this they would most certainly provide a much better experience.

This newsagency is in a busy high-street situation. Shops all around are open. The cafe next door was full. Trade could be good in the newsagency if they engaged with the opportunity on the street.

I don’t know the owner of this business but I’ll make contact to let them know my experience. If only this employee would do what they are paid to do … to work the shop floor, make the shopping experience more enjoyable and tidy the front of the shop so it connects with people on the street.

The employee I encountered is around the age of most people I noticed on the street. They could be more help to the business than sitting on the stool taking money and putting it in a drawer.

A business is a product of its leadership.

I am certain anyone could visit one of my shops at any time and have an experience that’s not as good as I would want. the challenge for us as retailers and leaders is to be clear in what we expect. We also need to hire for success and have a process for addressing shortcomings we hear about.

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Management tip

Sunday newsagency management tip: use day of week sales reporting to spot trends

The changes in magazine distribution from Monday, wednesday and Friday to Monday and Thursday are certain to change shopper traffic flow to newsagencies as many regular magazine shoppers are creatures of habit. It’s important we spot changing trends in our businesses early. For this, the best report is one listing sales by day of week.

Newsagents software should be able to report on at least eight weeks of sales on a page, making comparison easier. While I have started doing this in my stores, I am mindful of the impact of the our of sequence publishing of the royal baby issues.

In looking at day of week analysis newsagents need to look carefully at Wednesday, Thursday and Friday as I think these are the days on which we are most likely to measure an impact of the magazine distribution changes.

As I noted last week, I am seeing early evidence that suburban high street newsagents are losing some sales which capital city shopping centre newsagents could be beneficiaries.

Regardless of your situation, tracking sales by day of week and comparing reasonable periods can unlock a better understanding of what is happening in your business and open your eyes to trends you can leverage.

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magazine distribution
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