A newsagent colleague contacted Intermedia yesterday wanting to purchase InStyle – for the Hairdressing Professional magazine for sale to a customer. The Intermedia representative said they would not supply the newsagent and that they wanted the customer direct – expecting the newsagent to hand over customer details. After further discussion agreement was reached to supply the title at full retail price to the newsagent.

So, the newsagent, providing exceptional customer service and hunting down the publisher, is rewarded with no commission. The usual commission for a magazine is 25% of cover price. Shame shame shame Intermedia.

Intermedia needs to decide whether they want newsagents to support their other titles such as Inside Film. Newsagents could be excused for pulling Inside Film if Intermedia does not change its approach.

Newsagents are the magazine experts. They offer a low cost road to market for publishers, especially Australian publishers. Companies like Intermedia need to respect newsagents and work with them on building sales rather than rejecting them.

Following my post this morning about the Mother’s Day magazine subscription deals at ACP’s magshop, tonight in the mail at home I find the twelve page mother’s day offer from isubscribe. I hope people don’t subscribe with this mob. If people want to get their magazine on time and in good order they ought to ask their local newsagent for a putaway. isubscribe has a sweetheart deal with publishers which gives them a wholesale price per title considerably less than small business newsagents. It sucks.

It is deals like this between publishers and isubscribe which lead to consumers thinking newsagents are expensive. Look at Good health. I get 25% off the cover price, I promote it actively in store with at least two major aisle end displays a year plus a multi pocket display every month. Isubscribe has this title for 33% off and they make money on top of that. reader’s Digest is worse – they have it for 50% off. Lovatts crosswords 30% off. National Geographic 45% off. Life Etc. from our ABC 44% off.

Magazine publishers will tell us they need a balanced supply chain – subscriptions, newsagents, majors and other retailers. Yet it is newsagents who invest the most in promoting these titles in terms of display and shelf space. It is newsagents who are compensated the least.

I wish publishers would compensate me as handsomely as they seem to compensate isubscribe. I wish they supported small business. Once day they will wish they did.

The publicity given to the ‘production error’ on page 24 of Dolly and the subsequent cover up of the image on copies sold through major retailers (and not newsagents) should result in bumper sales. An anonymous correspondent has suggested to me that the ‘error’ was made in marketing. I have no idea if it’s true and don’t really care. However it happened, sales are strong and that’s good for magazines.

Merchandisers are reportedly visiting major retailers to cover up some offending (explicit) images in the current issue of Dolly from ACP Magazines. Newsagents are not receiving the same service and when they contact the distributor (Network Services) wanting to early return the title because of they problem they are refused. I haven’t seen the images myself and cannot comment specifically. If the distributor is involved in cover up action then this ought to be in all retail outlets and at their cost.

UPDATE: (11:56am) I’ve now seen the image at the Newslink store at Brisbane airport. Hmmm … that’s some production error. Yes it needs to be covered or pulled from the shelves.

NDD has distributed the launch issue of this Windows Vista magazine. They probably already know the Network has distributed this same title – as Australian magazine. So, once again, we have two versions of the same magazine. It’s pretty much only the cover which is different.

I wish that the magazine distributors would stop abusing newsagents by distributing identical titles in this way.

Something else which irks me about the NDD title is that this first issue is 99 pence in the UK yet A$15.95 here. Someone along the way is making a ton of money. Not the newsagents. The yellow new launch issue sticker covers the 99p price promotion on the front cover. Astute Australian consumers know they are being ripped off.

It’s good to see the Crikey magazine from the Australia Zoo doing well with the kids. This could be a project newsagents more formally partner with to foster their education programs. Newsagents and Australia Zoo make a good fit.