Selling My Crime Magazine locally

I think you have to think like the business owner...is the magazine professionally done? Is it attractive and something that people will buy or just flip through at checkout? I could also see how they would be hesitant to display the faces of "criminals" if it is a bad neighborhood and there could be a fear of backlash. Are these criminals convicted already or just the initial mug shots that might not mean anything?

The other two comments prior to this one hit the nail on the head perfectly. People don't want to read a magazine like this, it's not reading material. It's the sort of content that is briefly skimmed over in a newspaper, or publicized on a news report. A newspaper does exactly what your magazine does, but it also does a whole lot of other things such as local house prices, local news in general, ect. It's a whole bag of goodies and is probably cheaper to buy than your magazine is.

You should consider adding value to your magazine. You could add self-awareness techniques, self-defence techniques; make people aware of how they can prevent crime. Don't publicize criminal's faces, I can't imagine it serving the store owner or you any good.

- Jack.

What happens when one of them alleged criminals who's in the magazine walks in the store? Sorry but I would not sell this in my convenience store for any amount of money. = (

Depends on the Area you live in. In my area, there is a magazine called "busted." It basically takes all the pics from ppl who got arrested that week, and publishes their faces and the charges.

BOTTOM OF BARREL literature. Morbid reading that has no real subscribers---in other words ppl won't pay for a subscription. You'll get impulse buyers at best and those looking to see IF THEIR FRIENDS got popped that week. BEST BET is a large city with numerous busts. More Degenerates read this stuff than others.

Others have touched on the main points but here are my thoughts.

1. Mug shots are taken when someone is arrested. They are suspects and defendants but may or may not be criminals. What no seemed to point out is the liability that you have opened yourself up to depending on what you call it.

2. Related to point one is the fact that your magazine could be seen to sour the jury pool. If I am the lawyer defending this case and I see your magazine around town I will use it to argue for a new trial on appeal. And yes I would wait for appeal vs. asking for a new venue now. Always good to have reasons for appeal ready in case you lose.

3. Convenience stores tend to have poor demographics. And crime rates are higher in poorer demographics. Too great of an opportunity that a customer might show up in it. As a store owner that would not be a can of worms I would want to open up.

4. If there is truly a demand for this kind of magazine the 10 locations you have are more than enough to get it started. If the people want it they will talk about it and the awesome sales those stores get will help you get into the others. But if you are not getting enough sales at those 10 stores simply getting more stores isn't going to help the situation. And IMO the people who want this information simply go online to get it. The same place I assume you get it.

5. Based on that point are you allowed to take the information from your source and reprint it? Yeah I keep thinking of legal issues.

6. With the number of legal traps this could open up I wouldn't even create or sell this magazine without a lawyer looking it over and telling me what he thought. I have no idea if you have done this but you should.

7. Remember the money is in the advertising not the retail sales. So your lawyer, if he oks it, could be your first advertiser. Having an ad for a lawyer on the back page could create more confidence in your magazine for the store owners. After all if the lawyer thinks it is worth advertising in it must be worth stocking. Hell give him the ad for free.

Maybe it's not a product worth selling locally in the way you are currently doing. There are a lot of high risk for it that another warrior pointed out. Maybe schools would buy it? For like research and education? You might want to reconsider your target market and try to reach them? Start with the who and why and then go from there. I know as a writer I'd buy a copy just to get plot ideas.

To give you space, they take space from someone/something else, that's proven to make them money.

Go look at what they carry, especially in the area your magazine would be carried in, figure out if your magazine would be a better option for them and go tell them why.

Again, you are not asking them only to carry your magazine, you are asking them to not carry something else (or carry less of it). Give them a darn good reason why they should. Darn good reason = they make more money.

I bet it would do OK in low income areas aka the ghetto.

This type of rag can be very popular in the right neighborhoods.
In fact there are 2 different papers that do the same thing in my city and I often see them BOTH in various gas stations around town.

Part of the appeal is that people want to see who they know that got arrested.


My gut tells me that you are either not hitting the right area
or they dont feel like getting 30 cents per paper is worth their time and space.

They probably need to get a much higher percentage and besides you SHOULD be making money off the advertising anyway.

If I was doing this Id give them as close to 100 percent as I could(maybe deduct for the true cost of printing) just to encourage them.

why buy when it can be look up for free? plus there is Facebook version of this magazine and is free also.

Was a buzz for a month when it first came out but have not seen it since. The mag has probably just made it way to where you are at. Its just a fad.