partworks

While the animal farm partwork has been slower than expected, sales of the first issue of the helicopter partwork has been good. However, I suspect sales will face quickly because of the price point and highly specialists nature.

Cake Decorating is the best in recent history. I do wish these things were more predictable so we could manage space and time more effectively.

We have the new partwork, My Animal Farm, at the front of the newsagency, facing into the shopping mall. You can see it’s next to the start of our plush department. This adjacency makes sense given both products appeal to the same shopper.

National TV advertising starts today. I urge newsagents to make sure they have the title in prime position – to leverage the TV campaign for maximum benefit.

We sold out of the Christmas edition of the Cake Decorating partwork from De Aostini. It sold quickly and easily. A very nice impulse purchase for many shoppers. It was good to see a such a sales boost mid series for a part series.

One of the most common magazine supply complaints I hear from newsagents relates to partworks supply and the difficulty in getting backorders to help partworks collectors complete their collection.  Here is an email I received from a colleague newsagent that outlines a current concern:

I have had a few issues with missing parts for partworks recently and feel that all the responsibility falls onto the newsagent.

When an item is back ordered and it takes time to arrive they go outside of their return dates and become firm sale.

So we have to take it on firm sale because the distributor/supplier did not have enough parts, and in doing the right thing for the customer we have to take the risk.

I have a current instance where I have a back order for number 68 of the James Bond DB5 model.  The customer has spend in excess of $1300 and has been waiting more than 10 weeks for a part.

They are now hesitant to pick up parts as they feel it may not arrive (and NDC does not impart a great deal of confidence that it will).

This has also happened with other partworks, and customers drop off because parts have to be back ordered, so we do the legwork early and then due to short deliveries we miss out on the sales further down the track.

Anyway, this one case has been a bone of contention (and to make it that little bit harder this particular customer is profoundly deaf so all communications is on a sheet of paper!).  Thought it might make a good blog post.

The issue outlined here is often experienced by newsagents. Magazine distributors and partworks publishers need to find a better solution for newsagents and partworks collectors.

I am told that UK publisher DeAgostini has agreed to a trial in Woolworths outlets for the Cake Decorating partwork which has launched in Australia.  While only a trial in 30 Woolworths stores, this is a move set to hurt newsagents, long term supporters of partworks and the only retailers capable of handling the customer service queries and requirements around partworks.

Shame on DeAgostini and Network Services for this.

I have heard from Network Services that Eaglemoss appears likely to agree for newsagents to sell the chess board for the DC Chess Collection about which I wrote earlier this week. I expect the chess board to be available on a firm sale bases. Newsagents could pre-sell the board to mitigate against customer orders not collected.

We are promoting the launch of the DC Chess Collection partwork with this display facing the shopping mall for all passers-by to see.

While not expected to be a massive seller – given the specialist interest in chess – we are giving it the usual treatment. we are not our customers after all.

Partworks continue to do well for us, bringing in new shoppers to get to know us.

Check out the display the creative team at one of my newsagencies has put up for How Your Body Works.  It’s bold, eye catching and sure to help us make the most we can from the launch of this partwork.

I love how the stock has been used to create a background for the poster.  This is smart visual merchandising.

It’s at the front of the shop attracting browsers from the mall.

Network Services has announced to newsagents details of three partworks launches with each being exclusively distributed in the newsagency channel. Click here for the flyer.

The big launch is Cake Decorating with a large marketing budget for in-store and TV promotion. I was concerned that Cake decorating may be distributed to supermarkets. Thankfully, this is not the case.

I like partworks – for the traffic and the easy upsell. I love that these titles are exclusive to our channel.

With the TV campaign launching the Agatha Christie The Complete Collection partwork in full swing we have the title in front of shoppers at the counter as well as another location in0-store. Now is the time to make the move to grab the incremental business … on the back of a considerable TV spend.  As I see it we have a couple of weeks to make the maximum return from the launch of a part series so it’s worth investing prime space to achieve this.

Newsagents are the only retailers tagged in the TVC.

We are promoting The Agatha Christie Book Collection, the first of four partworks coming out over the next month or two, in each of my newsagencies.

Regulars here would know the I love new partwork series. I love that newsagents have these products exclusively. I love the traffic generated by the TV campaigns. I also love that artwork customers are more likely to purchase other items in-store than, say, newspaper shoppers.

For these reasons we give prime space to the promotion of new partwork series in the first couple of weeks. That’s what we are doing with the launch issue of The Agatha Christie Book Collection.