Booksellers Come Together for ABA Forum & NAIBAhood Gathering

On Thursday, April 20, about 20 booksellers attended an American Booksellers Association Booksellers Forum and Education Program, held at the Holiday Inn Carrier Circle in Syracuse, New York. The event was held in conjunction with the New Atlantic Independent Booksellers Association's NAIBAhood Gathering and Shoptalk. ABA COO Oren Teicher and Len Vlahos, director of BookSense.com and of ABA's education program, led the Booksellers Forum, and Vlahos presented the financial seminar "The 2% Solution."

Rob Stahl, the general book manager for the Colgate Bookstore in Hamilton, New York, hosted the event on behalf of NAIBA. Stahl was very pleased with the day's activities, including the education programming and discussion. He told BTW that he was particularly happy about word of a bookstore to open in Syracuse, and of new members to NAIBA. "A gay and lesbian bookstore named Lavender Inkwell will be opening [in Syracuse] in August," he said and noted that it will be the first independent to open there since My Sister's Words closed in 2003. "Also," Stahl said, "SUNY, Oswego [State University of New York] joined NAIBA as a result of the forum. That was great to hear."

The presentation of "The 2% Solution" once again drew an enthusiastic response. Archie Kutz of Lift Bridge Book Shop in Brockport, New York, said, " It's always good to hear the numbers again [at 'The 2% Solution'], and it can be revealing to those of us who have not had the opportunity before."

John Hutchison, co-owner of The Open Door Bookstore in Schenectady, concurred. "The presentation of 'The 2% Solution' was useful to go over, even though I'm familiar with all of the things that were discussed."

Stahl also praised the session, which he described as "informative and up-to-date." He told BTW, "All the booksellers there got a lot out of it. Then Oren and Len did a great job explaining what ABA is currently doing, fielding questions and comments. [The forum] reinforced how being a member of both organizations is really in the bookseller's best interest."

Hutchinson said that during the forum, booksellers discussed Constant Contact, an e-mail newsletter solution. "We have plans to sign up for it," he said. He explained that The Open Door currently posts newsletters online, but had refrained from e-mailing the newsletter to customers because of a few e-mail glitches, which Constant Contact would obviate. "Constant Contact provides methods to deal with bounced e-mail as well as data to inform us whether the e-mail is being read."

Hutchison was also pleased to hear about plans to emphasize "Independent Bookstores" in Book Sense materials. "The work being done to try to make Book Sense more understandable to the general public is a very good thing. Everyone agrees how important it is to associate Book Sense with local independents."

"It's always a pleasure to get together with other independent booksellers to discuss things we are doing in common or differently to grow our business," said Kutz. "And to have the opportunity to vent our joys, confusions, and frustrations with the ABA staff during the afternoon forum was good. I brought two managers from my store. They both seemed to benefit from the presentations and to learn from the dialog. And we did bring some ideas back to act upon."

Stahl announced at the meeting that the upcoming NAIBA Trunk Show will be held on June 13 in Syracuse at the Holiday Inn Carrier Circle. According to Stahl, this is the second publishers' "trunk show" that NAIBA has held in the area, and, based on the enthusiastic response to the first one, in July 2005, he predicts success with the second.

"A 'trunk show' features formal catalog presentations and display tables by publishers, wholesalers, and independent rep groups," Stahl explained. "It gives independent booksellers who aren't handled by field reps a chance to get frontlist presentations from major publishers. Booksellers can hear presentations in the morning and make appointments to place orders in the afternoon. We already have Penguin, Houghton Mifflin, John Wiley, and Holtzbrinck -- we know that after [BookExpo America], we'll hear from many, many more."

Stahl described Syracuse as a very central location in "the other New York."

"This forum and meeting was a great way to get together with so many upstate booksellers," Stahl said. --Nomi Schwartz