The Supanews Story

Supanews founder, Adrian Gaskin, has been involved in newsagencies for the past 35 years and from his experience, passion and drive, Supanews has grown to nearly 50 stores across four states and territories with an annual turnover in excess of $100 million.

The first Supanews store was opened in 1992 in Aspley, Queensland. Adrian took over an existing newsagency, increased its size, and range and converted it into the first 24 hour newsagency in Australia.  The success of this business allowed him to open more stores and he began to concentrate his efforts on the Brisbane CBD. More recently the chain has begun to concentrate on major shopping complexes and has opened stores in major QLD, NSW, ACT and VIC shopping centres.  A market leader, Supanews had grown to become the largest privately owned newsagency chain in Australia

The re-invention of the newsagency

In late 2004 Supanews broke new ground by launching the first ever full business format franchise system in the industry.  Prior to the launch of Supanews there had only been buying groups and banner groups (e.g. Newspower and Nextra) operating in the newsagency industry.  Buying groups are different to a franchise.  Buying groups are a loose grouping of independent businesses that come together to improve buying power.  Because of their independent nature, however, buying groups provide little or no managerial, system, operational or development support to the owner.  They are also unable to ensure that the customer experience is uniform the way that a strong retail chain or franchise can. 

Supanews identified that a strong business model franchise was the best way to simplify, strengthen and make the newsagency model more profitable for the owner.  Supanews strong brand, store design and retail principles have ensured that the Supanews business is the most compliant brand of newsagencies in Australia. 

Based on the strengths of the Supanews model, the systems and procedures developed, the franchise was rapidly accepted as a strong business model.

Supanews now has 32 franchises from a total of 50 stores. Supanews intends to maintain its rapid growth through 2010.