Seminar Offers Introduction to Bookselling at BEA

The American Booksellers Association is offering the free, full-day seminar “How to Succeed at Retail Bookselling: Introduction to the Bookstore Business” in New York City on Sunday, June 3, the day before ABA’s Day of Education and the opening of BookExpo America. The introductory workshop is open exclusively to ABA provisional members and employees of ABA regular member stores.

The program to be facilitated by Donna Paz Kaufman and Mark Kaufman of The Bookstore Training Group of Paz & Associates will help prospective booksellers begin to budget and plan for opening a bookstore; analyze margins and sales projections; review the key indicators for a successful site location; and understand what it takes to compete in today’s retail marketplace. Participants will receive a free badge to the BEA trade show and are encouraged to attend ABA’s Day of Education, sponsored by the Ingram Content Group, on Monday, June 4, at the Javits Convention Center.

Registration for the “How to Succeed at Retail Bookselling” seminar is required. Current ABA members can sign up here.

Non-ABA members can join the association and then sign up to participate in the one-day workshop, the ABA Day of Education, and BEA. The workshop will be held from 9:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. on June 3 at the St. Giles Hotel (130 East 39th Street, at the corner of Lexington).  BEA will be held at the Javits Convention Center from Monday, June 4, through Thursday, June 7.

Questions regarding the workshop and ABA’s Day of Education should be e-mailed to ABA Education Manager Lisa Winn.

Paz & Associates is offering a more intensive workshop retreat for prospective booksellers, from September 10 - 14 on Amelia Island, Florida. The workshop presented at BEA is comparable to Session 1 of the five-day workshop. Participants in the ABA workshop at BEA who want to delve deeper into the business of bookselling can register for Session 2 of the September Paz workshop. Paz & Associates gives ABA members a $200 discount on the full-week workshop and $100 if they attend just one of the week’s two sessions. Questions about the September workshop should be addressed to Donna Paz Kaufman and Mark Kaufman.

Questions about ABA membership should be directed to ABA’s Member Relationship Managers Kaitlin Pitcher and Nathan Halter.