Spacing magazine partnership with City of Toronto creates a pop-up shop

Spacing magazine,which demonstrated that retail can profitably augment publishing when it launched a store in 2014 at 401 Richmond Street, has partnered with the City of Toronto to create a pop-up shop on a prime corner where visitors enter Nathan Phillips Square.

The store, which is clearly aimed at the tourist trade, is right on the corner of Queen West and Bay. It is open Wednesday to Saturday 10 - 6 and will be an obvious go-to place to get that branded Toronto T-shirt.

The battle continues for space at the checkout

Magazines have for a very long time been a staple of the checkout line at grocery and other stores. The major reason is that they are the most profitable items, ahead of (among many other things) gum and candy. Yet, according to a post by Jerry Lynch of the International Periodical Distributors Association (IPDA) in Publishing Executive  Mars Inc. the owners of Mars bars and Wrigley candy and gum brands are putting on a concerted effort to push magazines out of the space and, of course, take it over themselves.

Research shows that magazines are the most profitable item at the checkout ($1.07 true profit per unit), bring in 5 times the revenue of candy and are 14th in profit among 229 total store categories.

In my view, the Mars push should be taken as a call to action. In response to competitors’ intensifying efforts to secure more retail display space, magazine publishers, NDs and distribution partners should all be intensifying our own efforts to shout our category’s documented strengths from the rooftops.

How long is the next streetcar?

The new Bombardier streetcars that will soon be on the streets of Toronto are celebrated by Spacing magazine with T-shirts that illustrate how long the new vehicles are by having them wrap around to the back of the shirt. 

The T-shirts are available for pre-order for $30 from Spacing's online store and will be shipped in mid-September. They will be officially launched at the end of October at the magazine's new retail store at 401 Richmond Street at the regular $35 price. So it's a really good way to celebrate a bold initiative by the magazine and a step forward in public transit. There is also a T-shirt that shows the various generations of streetcars that have gone before.

Spacing magazine to open retail "city store" in October

Spacing magazine, which has been an innovator in many things, has now officially announced that it is going into the retail business this fall, opening Toronto's first "city store" on the ground floor of 401 Richmond Street. The store -- which is hoping to open October 4, the night of Nuit Blanche, will be offering all kinds of items celebrating Toronto and Canadian cities.

"Spacing‘s new home will be at 401 Richmond, the massive arts and culture cluster near Queen Street West and Spadina that is home to over 140 amazing organizations, galleries, and arts/media-focused businesses," the magazine says in a post on its blog. 

"We believe our new home will let us offer our readers something hardly any other Canadian magazine can: a real retail experience. Our new space will be a storefront, created just for us, with direct access right off of Richmond Street West, between Spadina and Peter. And housed within our store will be the office of our magazine staff."

Spacing has been working with a number of local designers to bring new items to the e-store, which it says will eschew touristy kitsch. But it will have the famous Spacing buttons, depicting subway stops and landmarks from cities across the country.

"While the move is rooted in our philosophy about public space, it’s also a business decision. The way magazines have operated for decades is no longer a model that works in the digital age. By opening up a retail store we are diversifying our potential revenue as well as creating greater awareness of our brand (we’ll stop the biz jargon now)."