Whilst there are fractional increases in pence per copy margins (0.9p on the Sunday Mirror and 1.14p on the Sunday People), Mirror Group is keeping to itself the remaining 10p price increase on both titles beginning this week.
Despite pleas from the NFRN, Mirror Group chooses to ignore the plight of independent retail newsagents who continue to be undermined by ever-increasing operating costs and continual carriage charge hikes from wholesalers, who are awarded distribution contracts from publishers.
NFRN claims that without ongoing support through pro rata terms, more and more retailers will be driven to either giving up their business altogether, or certainly giving up news retailing for other products that offer better margins with far less aggravation.
NFRN Chief Executive, Paul Baxter, says “The NFRN and its sister companies are working at their hardest with business partners in every sector of our members’ business in order to deliver mutual benefit for both sides. There is no shortage of business partners and if some, by their actions, do not merit our support, they will not get it.”
NFRN National President Martyn Brown added: “Newsagents run their businesses as profit centres and for no other reason. Loyalty has no place in today’s cut-throat world and they devote a great deal of their management time to ensuring every penny of profit is squeezed out of every inch of their businesses and that their time is devoted to the most profitable items. If any stock item is overtaken in terms of profitability they will not hesitate in either demoting it to a less favourable ranking or getting rid of it altogether.”
