Building Your Brand At the Corner Newsstand - Brief Article

A grassroots single-copy campaign not only helped Time Out New York find space on NYC's crowded newsstands, it jump-started the title's 132 percent growth in subscription sales.

"Welcome to New York. Now get out." That cornerstone tagline from Time Out New York's initial ad campaign five years ago was plastered on everything from buses to subway-station entrances. Before anyone knew what TONY was, we had to convince busy New Yorkers that this magazine could help them organize their free time outside of their homes and offices. And one of the things that made us so memorable was our grassroots approach to building brand awareness and sales at the newsstand.

We wanted to make sure that people associated the brand with being outside and active, so our launch centered around an outdoor campaign that relied heavily on help from our newsstand partners. At launch, TONY put together a team of seven field representatives who walked around the island of Manhattan each week visiting newsstand dealers and putting up posters of that issue's cover.

To maintain our focus on the outdoors during the launch, TONY developed partnerships with advertisers and cultural institutions, and devised outdoor signage that would benefit both parties. These signs immediately connected TONY to the city's culture and entertainment. One of the first groups to partner with us on outdoor signage was the Public Theater, which agreed to share a wall space on a highly trafficked corner of New York's East Village.

While the outdoor signs reminded consumers that they could go the nearest newsstand and pick up a copy, we also wanted to reinforce our brand at the point of purchase--and that's where the newsstand field reps and posters proved so valuable. Because we're committed to maintaining our presence in the field, we've continued our single-copy poster campaign and increased our field force to between 10 and 12 representatives. We show up every week, not just when we have special issues. We listen to each newsstand's story. And if a dealer is experiencing any problems related to TONY, we make sure to follow up on whatever is within our power to change.

To boost single-copy sales further, we supply our newsstand partners with T-shirts, hats and other promotional items. We sponsor contests at the newsstands and give cash to the dealer who lets us put up the most posters in a given week or who has the best display of our magazine (for those stores where local ordinance doesn't allow for posters). As part of that program, we also provide awnings to dealers. Both sides benefit--they get a new awning, and TONY gets permanent signage for our brand.

Maintaining this field force is expensive--it's probably equal to a very costly regional, single-copy promotion. And we incur these expenses every month, not just on special issues that we want to highlight. We don't do a typical P&L on the copies sold because it wouldn't be an accurate measurement. It's a brand-building effort. Plus, as a regional, we don't use a national distributor, which saves the brokerage fee, but makes our own field force all the more important.

TONY's grassroots mentality remains at the core of everything we do. As we grow, we never forget the people who supported us from the beginning. We don't forget Coliseum Books just because we have great display at Barnes & Noble.

In the past three years, TONY has shown not only a 132 percent increase in subscription sales, but has also increased newsstand sales by 18 percent. We believe that this is because we never lost our focus at the newsstand. We know that keeping the TONY brand in people's consciousness week after week has helped us constantly gain new readers and convert newsstand buyers to subscribers.

Jennifer Culhane is the circulation director of Time Out New York.

COPYRIGHT 2000 Copyright by Media Central Inc., A PRIMEDIA Company. All rights reserved.
COPYRIGHT 2003 Gale Group