Indigo stores offering four magazines for the price of three

Let's make a deal

Indigo Books and Music is offering to sell any four magazines for the price of three as part of its "Black Friday" weekend in-store promotion, advertised in various papers and on now through Sunday. This effective 25% discount (depending on the cover prices) applies to all books and magazines (some restrictions apply).

This "buy 3 and get the 4th free" initiative by the cross-country chain raises the question again why magazines can't use discounts and off-price promotions more often on newsstands. We have no "day-old bread" discounts, for instance, and don't slash the price of last month's issue once the latest issue is released. Of course Indigo has the means to manage this and is principally aiming at selling books at a cut price, but the principle is the same. I'm not keen on seeing magazines devalued, but if you were going to be buying single copies of magazines for the Christmas morning stockings and an Indigo store is nearby, this is a great deal, particularly as the holiday issues of most magazines are in-stores now.

Speaking of great deals, remember to take advantage of Magazines Canada's Buy 2, Get 1 Free subscription promotion, too.That's an even better deal than Indigo's. [Disclosure: one of our advertisers -- see in the right sidebar].]

Indigo cashes out of Kobo; CEO Reisman says Indigo will continue innovative changes

Magazine publishers must look with wonder, and a certain amount of dread, on the $315 million deal by Indigo Books & Music to sell its 44% share in e-reader Kobo to Japanese e-commerce firm Rakuten. Thereby, Indigo makes a tidy return on its initial investment in the business, but gets out before the necessity for $100 million plus in capital that would be required to continue to play against large, global participants, according to an interview by Jordan Timm of Canadian Business with CEO Heather Reisman and Kobo CEO Michael Serbinis.

The dread may be because Reisman makes it even more clear that Indigo is moving away from the print-on-paper business to be some other sort of business altogether. 

While publishers continue to rely on Indigo for its dominance in the single copy sales business, Reisman's thoughts clearly continue to be elsewhere and that can't be good.

We must and will fundamentally transform Indigo. The idea of a book retailer as it existed up until the last two years—that option no longer exists. We did two things two years ago: we made the decision to commit to Kobo, and we also made the decision to fully transform Indigo into a whole new kind of retailer and e-tailer, and we are on that track right now. And there’s no doubt that some of that money will be used in that transformation process, both digitally and physically. We caught the wave on e-reading and had a tremendous success with Kobo. I see Indigo as that kind of innovative platform, and we'll do it again.

Whether that innovation includes, or squeezes out, the newsstand is something that will be of very real concern to magazine publishers. Indigo's trajectory over the past two decades was to decimate the independent and small chain bookstore sector; it is no longer there to backstop the magazine single copy business when (if?) Indigo loses interest.

Kobo service offering two-week free trial of Canadian and U.S titles, but no Canadian magazines

Kobo, the e-reading service controlled by Indigo Books & Music, is offering a two-week free trial download of a menu of popular Canadian and American newspapers, and U.S. but, curiously not one Canadian, magazines. 

This offer includes digital editions of the following Canadian newspapers :

• Calgary Herald 
• Edmonton Journal 
• Montreal Gazette 
• National Post 
• Ottawa Citizen 
• Regina Leader-Post 
• Saskatoon Star-Phoenix 
• Vancouver Province 
• Vancouver Sun 
• Victoria Times-Colonist and  
• The Globe & Mail.  

 U.S. titles available included both newspapers and magazines:

• The New York Times
• The Wall Street Journal
• The Scientist
• The Seattle Times
• Wilson Quarterly 
• Foreign Affairs 
• American Scholar
• China International Business
• Columbus Dispatch
• Guideposts
• Harvard Business Review
• National Review
• New York Observer 
• PC Magazine
• Publishers Weekly
• Reason
• The Christian Science Monitor Daily Briefing and
  
• The Nation

Following the two week free trial, monthly subscriptions start at $13.99 for newspapers and $2.99 for magazines. The current edition of a newspaper or magazine can be immediately added to a customer's library,and with the subscription, customers will receive wireless delivery directly to their Kobo  iPad or iPhone apps or their Kobo Wireless e-Reader.  The new apps are available for download today on iTunes. Subscriptions and the free trials can be accessed directly from theiPad,iPhone, and the Kobo Wireless e-Reader's onboard store,or from the KoboNewsstand at www.kobobooks.com.

Indigo, Canada's largest bookstore chain, operates Kobo in partnership with Borders Group, REDgroup Retail and Cheung Kong Holdings .