Improving single copy sales – just being there is half the battle
By DAVID GREER
Member Services Director

Having a front page with the latest news, gripping headlines and unique photos will spur single-copy sales but so does just having the paper available for customers.

That was the message from Kent Carpenter, former circulation director with the Owensboro Messenger-Inquirer and now with USA Today in Chicago.

Carpenter, speaking to KPA winter convention attendees in Lexington, cited research from a Newspaper Association of America study that looked at the single-copy buying habits of 4,049 buyers from five papers. All of the customers were in the habit of buying their papers from convenience and grocery stores.

Among the things learned, Carpenter said:

1. Sell-outs annoy customers. One-third give up and don’t buy a paper at all when none is available.

2. Twelve percent then buy a competing paper.

3. Twenty-three percent went to buy a paper but it wasn’t there yet.

4. Nearly 75 percent said they have a problem buying a paper at least one a month.

Four ideas for building single copy sales, Carpenter said, include:

1. Getting inserts for single copy papers. Often, advertisers don’t include single copy issues.

2. Bag Sunday papers. It keeps sections and inserts together.

3. Have racks with change devices.

4. Get dealers to call in when they are running low on papers.

Other facts revealed by the NAA research, Carpenter said, include:

1. About 60 percent of weekday single-copy buyers are men but the reverse is true on Sunday when about 60 percent of single-copy buyers are women — largely because female readers want the advertising content in the paper.

2. Fourteen percent of Sunday-only buyers will only buy the paper after seeing it.

3. Thirty-five percent of weekday single-copy buyers and 31 percent of Sunday-only buyers say they go to the store only to buy the paper. Carpenter suggests each of your single-copy outlets know those figures.

4. At 50 cents, 75 percent of people say a paper is a good value but the approval level drops to just 12 percent when the price hits 75 cents.

5. Unfortunately, 29 percent of single-copy buyers say they went to single copy because they were having delivery problems.