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EXCLUSIVE: Retailers keep media screens as compensation for missing payments

Retailers are owed annual payments of £500 by Convenience Digital Media

Hi Street Digital

Retailers with advertising screens under contract with Convenience Digital Media (CDM) are keeping the displays as compensation for not receiving promised annual payments.

As part of their agreements, retailers were promised annual payments of £500 plus VAT for displaying supplier advertisements in their stores at no extra cost. One CDM retail partner told Better Retailing: “I haven’t been paid for three years now. I’m going to keep the screen and sell it off or use it myself. Other retailers I’ve spoken to haven’t been paid either and they’re thinking of doing the same.”

CDM was founded in 2017 by Huseyin Sanli, then the largest shareholder of rival screen provider High Street Digital (HSD). At the time, it was alleged that Sanli, alongside former HSD shareholders, attempted to win retailers over from HSD. HSD confirmed the two companies were separate.

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HSD went into administration in December 2017, but its assets were bought by Lomax Digital Ltd, who is offering a similar service trading under the HSD name. Lomax Digital director Dominic Sullivan alleged to Better Retailing that CDM has ceased trading.

A HSD sales rep added that Bolton-based Scan Computers, who CDM appointed to install 250 screens in stores, has taken ownership of the screens after not being paid for its work.

HSD has been approaching store owners who had signed agreements with CDM offering them six-to-eight-week trials of their services. It has agreed to buy the screens from Scan Computers if the retailers decided to continue their relationship.

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Sullivan told Better Retailing: “We have nothing to do with CDM. The legacy of the estate is out there and we have screens in similar convenience stores. We thought it’s a good idea for us to go out and acquire these screens to add to our estates. We’ve currently got 180 screens and we hope to build long-term business relationships with more people.”

However, the rep warned that the screens are still under the ownership of Scan Computers if retailers decide not to stay with HSD. They said: “We’ll switch our content off from the screens because we don’t want to push people, but then the retailer needs to speak to Scan Computers on whether they want to take ownership.”

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