How many did we actually sell?
The magazine is printed, subscribers' copies go to the mail house, and the rest go out to shops: some through a specialist distributor to independent bookshops and newsagents, some directly to a few stockists you deal with yourself. The shops sell what they can and return or report the unsold copies at the end of the on-sale period.
Months later, the distributor's report arrives as a spreadsheet showing supplied, sold and returned by outlet, with deductions. The direct stockists send their figures by email, or not at all. Meanwhile, the print run for the next issue was set weeks ago, based on a guess.
Why sell-through stays a mystery
The data exists, but it arrives slowly, from different places, in different forms, and long after the decisions it should inform.
- Distributor reports come per issue, months after the on-sale date.
- Direct stockists report irregularly, and some just pay for what sold.
- Returns may be pulped at the shop and reported as figures, not copies.
- Outlet names differ between reports, so the same shop appears twice.
- The print run is set before the previous issue's figures are in.
What not knowing costs
| Blind spot | Consequence |
|---|---|
| Real sell-through unknown | Print runs set too high or too low |
| Poor outlets not identified | Copies go to shops that return most of them |
| Strong outlets not identified | Shops that sell out are not given more |
| Direct stockists not chased | Money owed for sold copies is never collected |
| No per-issue picture | You cannot tell which covers or themes sold |
Printing and shipping copies that come back is one of the larger avoidable costs for an independent title.
A per-issue sales view, built from your reports
- Import of your distributor's sale-or-return reports in the format they send.
- A simple form or upload for direct stockists to report sold and unsold copies each issue, with reminders when figures are due.
- An outlet list that merges different spellings of the same shop into one record.
- Per-issue totals of supplied, sold and returned, updated as each report arrives, with an estimate for outlets still to report, labelled as such.
- Outlet-level sell-through across several issues, to guide next issue's allocations.
- Invoices for direct stockists raised in Xero or QuickBooks from their reported sales, if you invoice on sale.
Planning the next issue with figures
When you set the next print run, you see the last few issues' sell-through by channel, with the most recent one partly estimated. Shops that consistently sell most of their copies are flagged for bigger allocations. Shops that return most of them are flagged for review. Direct stockists who have not reported are chased automatically.
Over a year, patterns become visible: which issues sold best on the newsstand, which outlets grew, which went quiet. The editorial and commercial conversations can start from the same figures.
None of this changes how you deal with your distributor. It just turns the reports they already send into something you can use before the next print run is ordered.
A worked example helps. The spring issue went to a set number of outlets through the distributor and a dozen direct stockists. Six weeks after the off-sale date, the direct stockists have reported through the form and the view already shows their sell-through, alongside an estimate for the distributor outlets based on the last few issues. When the distributor's report arrives, the estimate is replaced with actual figures, and the difference is shown. By the time the summer print run is set, you are working from something close to the real sale rather than a hunch.
You probably need this if
- You set print runs without knowing the last issue's real sale.
- Distributor reports are filed rather than analysed.
- Some direct stockists have never reported or paid for an issue.
- You cannot say which shops sell your magazine best.
- Returns feel high but you cannot say where they come from.