Start Your Own Highly Profitable Shopping Center Papers

One of the easiest of all businesses to establish, publishingshopping center papers-- CAN MAKE you very rich--almost as fastas finding gold, or inheriting an oil well.
Revenue and profits come from two main sources: The businessesin the shopping center your paper serves, and the people readingthe paper. It doesn't matter that there's already a "Shopper'sPaper" in your area, or that you know nothing about thepublishing business and don't own a printing press.
The first thing is to understand the specific needs of yourmarket. The stores, shops and businesses in the downtown areaadvertise to reach all the people, and thus, they're hurting fromthe competition of similar stores, shops and businesses in theneighborhood shopping centers closer to where the people actuallylive. Yet, these shopping center stores, shops and businessesONLY SERVE CUSTOMERS LIVING WITHIN A 5-MILE RADIUS OF THEIRBUSINESS LOCATION!
So, the thing to do is organize a plan, and then work thatplan. Contact the store owners or managers of the stores in eachshopping center in your area.
You can include stores or shops and businesses not in theshopping center itself, but clustered within the same immediatearea. However, it's important that your emphasis be placed on theindividuality of each shopping center.
Explain to each of these business people that you're starting a"shoppers paper" that will carry advertising only for businessesin that particular shopping center. With this kind of "localadvertising media," the competition, nor have to bear theadvertising costs of city-wide circulation.
The second selling point in your distribution or circulationsystem. Take a section of your city street map; draw a 5-milecircle around each shopping center; then take it to your localquick print shop, and have him give you several printed copiesblown up to twice the original size.
Then as you're selling each business owner, show him theshopping center location on your map with the 5-mile circlearound it. Explain that your door-to-door distributors leave acopy at each home or apartment within that circle only. Thismeans you'll have to estimate how many homes or apartments arewithin each shopping center's customer circle.
Getting your papers out to all of these homes and apartmentsneedn't be that big a problem. Simply talk with the 7th and 8thgrade counselors at the schools within the service circle.Arrange to pay the counselors $15 per thousand papers deliveredfor you. The idea is to get the counselors to line up thestudents to do the delivering for you, and pay them a percentageof the total you give him. The same plan can be worked with boyscout and/or girl scout troops. You might even contact the youthorganizations at the churches within the service circle, andpropose your delivery operation as a fund-raising project.
At the bottom line, the businesses gathered in or near eachshopping center will buy advertising space in your paper becauseyour rates will be cheaper; you'll be carrying advertising for aspecific location only; and your distribution will be direct totheir customers only.
You can begin, and handle all phases of your business operationsingle-handedly, but after the first couple of editions, you'llmake much more money by hiring others to do the selling for you.Simply run an ad in your weekend newspapers, promising bigincomes to commission type advertising sales people. Word your adso that those interested call you on the phone.
When they call --get their name, address and phone number. Thenexplain that you're looking for just a few top-notch go-getterswho can handle several thousand dollars a week in advertisingcommissions from individual merchants located in neighborhoodshopping centers. Ask them to tell you a little bit aboutthemselves, and then invite them to get acquainted meeting in thebanquet or meeting room you've reserved in a local restaurant ormotel. Give them the time, and date, then tell them you'll seethem at the meeting.
As the meeting, show them a prototype or dummy of one of yourpapers. Tell them they'll each be assigned a territory thatincludes 3-shopping centers. You then explain/teach them thereasons why there's big money in shopping center papers just asI've explained to you.
Explain your advertising rates---$10 per column inch for apress run/circulation of 5,000; $15 for 10,000 and/or $20 for15,000 copies distributed---and that you pay 50% for each sale.
Each paper has room for $1,400 worth of advertising as a single8 1/2 by 11 sheet printed on both sides; double that for an 11 by17 sheet folded in half; or 4-times that much as two 11 by 17sheets. Multiply the salesman's commission of &700 per papertimes three for each of them to make $2,100 per week--assumingthat you publish your papers on a weekly schedule.
Remember, your basic idea should be to create an individual"shoppers paper" for as many different shopping centers aspossible. Because of the closeness of prospective advertisers ina shopping center, a good salesman will be able to sign all thestores in at least three different shopping centers in a week.
Once you've explained the marketing philosophy behind yourpapers, and the money potentials available, you should have allthe eager salesmen you care to sign on. Remember, each salesperson is assigned 3-different shopping centers--you give him adummy of your paper for each of his shopping centers, with thespace availabilities marked--send him out to fill those spaceswith paid advertisers--and you'll both be home free!
Whenever possible, ask for and get your money up-front or atthe time of the sale. In many instances, this won't be possible,so you'll need some sort of standard contract. A short visit toyour local community college advertising department, or yourlocal public library for a look at a few instruction books on howto draw up a space advertising contract, will give you a form tocopy and use as your own. Billing your advertisers at the end of30-days will bring in lots of sales, but it will also require abookkeeper/secretary and statements as well as letterheadenvelopes and postage.
Allowing your advertisers to buy now and pay later will alsorequire that you allow your salesmen to "draw" against thecommission they have coming. This too will present some specialproblems, namely a need for operating capital. Most of the timeyou'll be able to sell or factor your accounts receivable forabout 80% of the total due. When you do this, you'll be giving upanother 20% of your gross income, but you will have immediatecash available. The thing you must do is weigh your operatingcosts against the overall benefits and make your decision basedupon these factors.
The design, layout and production of your paper should be quitesimple. Visit a local stationary and/or office suppliesstore---pick up a blue printers pencil, some larger transfer(rub-on) letters (either 60-point or 72 point size should besufficient for your needs), and also--pick up a pad of "fade out"graph paper and a roll or two of border tape.
Use the rub-on letters to print or write the masthead or titleof each of your shopping center's papers at the top of the graphpaper. With your border tape and razor blade, make a U-shapedframe around the page, a half inch in from the outside edge ofthe paper.
If you're getting started from your "kitchen table," and usinga typewriter, make sure your type is "elite" or the small type.Now, measure the inside of your frame from the bottom of yourmasthead to the top of your border tape at the bottom of yourframe; and from side to side, measuring from the inside edges ofyour border tape along the sides. You should end up with a space9 1/2 inches deep by 7 1/2 inches wide.
Take these measurements to your local print shop and ask themfor the dimensions of a space 30% larger. This should amount to aspace 10 3/4 by 13 1/2 inches--so ask him for some 11 by 14 inchpaper. Scrap paper that has a clean backside will do quitenicely.
With your blue pencil, lay out a frame 10 3/4 by 13 1/2inches--then divide the 10 3/4 width into seven equal columns.Run the paper into your typewriter and type out the classifiedads you have set. If you have a camera ready ad that's too largefor your regular column dimensions, paste it into position onthis sheet. When you have this page all "written" or pasted up,take it to your printer and have him reduce it to 70 % of itscurrent size and run off a couple of copies for you. Cut out thisreduced copy and paste it inside your master frame, add anyproper sized camera ready ads and you're ready to take your paperto press.
Almost all shopping center papers start out as one pagecirculars printed on both sides, and put together on the "kitchentable" as I've described here. Working alone and trying to startfrom scratch, you probably won't have all your available spacesold when you go to press. If this is the way it works out foryou, simply fill in the empty spaces with ads of your own.
Promotional ads inviting people to call you, for example, forad rate information, and to place their ads.
Also, some of your better mail order offers. In order to givethe impression of lots of ads from lots of different people,enlist the help of your relatives and friends--allow them toadvertise a For Sale or Trade item free. It's important that youseemingly have ads from a lot of different people with lots ofdifferent phone numbers and/or addresses listed.
For these classified ads, you should charge $1 per line, andhence, the name "dollar Papers." Don't forget, your second sourceof income will be garnered from people who have seen or read yourpaper, and place ads of their own as result.
Once you've got separate pages--a front and a back--for yourfirst paper ready, simply take it to your quick-print shop andhave run off the number of copies you've promised to circulatefor your advertisers. Have him print it on yellow or orange 20pound bond, or even recycled construction paper.
Until you really get rolling, you can hire a couple of kids tohand out your papers to everyone as they drive into the shoppingcenter parking lot, drop off a stack for check-out standgiveaways at each store or shop in the shopping center, and/orpersuade a couple of newspaper carriers to include one with eachnewspaper they deliver. Another fast hand-out method is to hire astudent to give one to each bus rider as he gets off the bus atbusy "park and ride" locations.
As your shopping center papers become known, you take on salespeople to do the selling for you; when you have more space tohandle the requests for advertising space, contact a largerprinter who works with web presses and news-print paper. Lookaround, and you'll find one who'll handle all your typesetting,layout, printing and even bulk delivery to your distributionpick-up points. Expanding to tabloid production will lower yourproduction costs, give you greater efficiency and result in moreprofits for your business.
Where there is really tough competition, many publishers ofShopping center Papers include stories about the shoppingcenter---what the land was used for before it was developed as ashopping center---profiles on the different store owners, wherethey're from and what they did before opening their store orshop---and news of community interest within the customer circle.Many increase their incomes by running mail order opportunity adsfrom dealers in all parts of the country.
Basically, shopping center paper is the same as a mail order adsheet. The big difference is that it serves as an advertisingshowcase for a small circle of merchants in a specific area, andis circulated among the people most likely to do their shoppingin that specific small circle of merchants; each circle has aneed for an advertising showcase of its own, and it will be toyour benefit to turn away advertising requests from merchantsoutside that circle.
The only advertising you'll have to do is via the quality andimage you project with each issue or edition of your papers.There are a number of popularity-building promotions you can, andshould run: Free ads for baby sitting and/or child care services;$100 worth of free groceries if the shopper spots his picture orname in your paper; and free merchandise or service for solvingpicture puzzles. Don't look for much free publicity or help fromnewspapers, radio and/ or TV stations in your area--at least, notuntil you're very well established, because you are in directcompetition with them.
As mentioned earlier, this is an easy business to organize,requires no special education or training, and will pretty muchperpetuate itself once you're beyond the start-up stages. Theimportant thing of course, is the opportunity for at least onesuch paper in even the smallest communities. The profit potentialin even small to medium-sized cities is almost beyond belief...
You have an idea, and I've provided the organizational detailsto make it work for you--- it's working very profitably for a lotof entrepreneurs in a number of locations around thecountry---the only thing missing now, is action on your part. getwith it, and start enjoying the fruits of your own success!