#Transactor
3 messages in this thread
Don,
I think your viewpoint is in wide circulation. But it begs the question:
If that was true, why bother? If you _don't_ buy, you save yourself the
cost of a number of trans!atlantic flights, a few bottles of scotch,
negotiation, contract writing, legal fees AND YOU STILL HAVE A DEAD MAG!
I'm confident it wasn't for a mail permit. That was even before the
Canadian govt. proposed to wring more blood out of the mag biz than was in
it! I'm sure that a UK mag could've done mailing here then and probably
still can today. They never tried to promote their mags here. In fact,
their mag was better distributed here than ours was!
Further, *IF* they wanted to do a hatchet job on it, the only value in
that would be if you then buried the purchased title and substituted your
own mag to the subscribers. That didn't happen and never looked like it
would.
I conclude that acquiring Transactor:
1) did not provide a business advantage WRT mail access or similar,
2) DID have "prestige" but only to a segment that was too small; and
3) did not result in an increased circulation for the purchasing mag
So what's the damn point? I can only conlude that the ONLY reason to buy
Transactor is because you believe that there's a loyalty in the readership
that you can make money from if you operate it effectively. That didn't
happen….
Now I'm the first to admit that I know precious little about business (the
financial/economic side anyway. I _do_ have a pretty good understanding of
publishing by now.) And if I feel I can't take something at face value,
it's because I feel I'm seeing a mask instead of the face behind it; but I
won't know what that face is.
However, a few moments ago, I thought I might have had an answer. I may
do, but I have a doubt as well. My answer: It would give an opportunity to
forge new or strengthen/consistent relationships with advertisers, which
might be transferable to the purchasing mag. THAT looks to me like a
possible scenario if your viewpoint is, in fact, true.
However, it raises other questions: Why did we have a sequence of sales
people who were not sales people? Hmmm… the first in the sequence was
Antony's son Max, as some of you might know. He _did_ have a background in
sales. In fact, I remember that an Amiga software company official came
over to our booth at a show and told Antony that he was pleased that Max
had been sent over to do T sales. Although this might seem to support my
"possible scenario", I believe that company was _already_ transacting with
the UK mag.
But Max was only on the job for a few months; after which time, he
returned to England. We then had a series of people, only one of whom had
a background in sales – the guy who vanished mysteriously. :/
It still doesn't make sense to me. I'll have to persist with my original
(and ongoing) hypothesis: cent per cent incompetence. Unless someone else
can come up with a compelling alternative.
Malcolm
Malcolm,
I suspect it was a kind of 'money laundering'. I don't mean in the
sense of turning illegaly gained profits into appearing to have come from a
legal source…but rather a method of showing a large write off from a small
investment.
It happens here in the broadcast industry all the time. I once worked
for a radio station. It was sold three times in the 8 years I was there. Each
time, the new owners cut back on things and claimed they were losing money on
the operation…yet each time it sold…it sold for a much higher price that it
was bought for. I got friendly with one of the general managers and asked how
the system worked. He was quite candid with me…if you looked at the
ownership papers, you found the local station was a separate corporation. That
corporation was a wholy owned subsidary of a holding company…generally…one
holding company per station!
That holding company in turn…was owned by a 2nd holding company that
may have held 2 or 3 other holding companies. That 2nd level company was held
in turn by a 3rd level company! And that 3rd level company was owned by the
broadcaster. The broadcaster was a privately owned company, the family that
owned that company were principles in the lower 3 holding companies and the
corporate station entity itself.
It was so intertwined with trusts, and ownership groups (same people,
just different titles in each company) and private holdings that from an
accounting viewpoint…they could basically bury the profits to the point they
essentially paid no taxes.
Did they bleed the local station dry? Yup…by the time an advertising
dollar made it to the top broadcaster…it was a dime. By the time a dollar
investment made it to the bottom…it was written off 4 or 5 times.
I didn't understand a lot of the intricacies (sp?)…but the overall
point was quite clear….having a money losing company can generate more top
level after-tax dollars than the dollars lost at the low level entity.
In other words…the owners got more money in their pockets in the end.
Don
Don,
Well, that proves my statement that I know squat about business. I only
understood the last sentence. :/
But I'll read it over and over and ask knowledgeable people what it means.
Having the light come on may be a lot to expect <g> but, hopefully, the
murk will thin.
Thanks!
Malcolm