ABA President Encourages a Sharing of Ideas

To All of My ABA Fellow Booksellers,

Summer has arrived here in the Chicago area — we have sort of skipped the last of winter and most of spring.  We are experiencing a really schizophrenic season.  Foot traffic is up, and the downtown areas where our three retail stores are located are hopping! 

I thought I would share with you a few new things we are doing in our stores and out, in the hope that we can get some dialogues going on BookWeb’s forums [1] and on the ABC Listserv on great ideas to keep the momentum going in our stores, and what we can do to reach outside our walls.  We, more than any other independent trade retail organization, share with each other in ways that would seem alien to others.  So let’s get those brilliant creative juices flowing and share!

We have started a new monthly program, which has been going for about eight months, called “ABFF”— Anderson’s Bookshops Featured Favorites. We feature and give 25 percent off for the month on one newer adult and kids’ title and a forgotten backlist title for both adult and kids.  We blast, display, etc. the four titles and, as a result, have seen this grow with each and every month. It’s so easy, and we are asking for customer suggestions.

After going to the CAMEX show in Salt Lake City this past March, we are finally, after many years of good intentions, creating our own line of gift items featuring Naperville and Downers Grove that we can sell and offer exclusively.  We have constant requests for Naperville-related items and hope to have a whole line of merchandise that showcases our city by the last quarter of the year— upscale cloisonné ornaments, shirts, coasters, mugs, magnets, postcards, tiles, etc.  We have created and sold many of these items featuring our store logo, but now want to be the place for cooler city-related gifts.  Using local printers and suppliers, where possible, we know we can make huge margins on these items. 

This past week, at our IndieBound Naperville [2] meetings, I discussed a program that we are going to roll out this coming fall for many of the group’s members:  a “scrip” type of gift card program that will allow individual schools, districts, and not-for-profits to purchase gifts cards from our many indie members at a 20 percent discount and then turn around and sell them at full cost.  So many of the existing programs out there are regional and national and only feature large chains and big box stores.  What a great alternative to support local!  

On the World Book Night [3] front, we are hosting our giver parties on Sunday, April 15!  I know many of you are doing the same—so let’s party hearty and share some ideas.  We are printing up shirts with the WBN logo for each of our givers and also giving them 20 bookstore bookmarks to pass out with their books.  Our local TV station is covering our parties and is then going to follow a few of our givers with cameras as they pass out their books on the night of the 23^rd.

And on a crazy note: We participate in three of our community parades every year— Labor Day, Hometown Holidays, and St. Patrick’s Day.  Our IndieBound group always marches with us, and we also have our bookstore van, kids passing out candy, a Dixieland jazz group from our local music store, and six to eight storybook characters.  I’m usually Curious George.  It sounds crazy, but I absolutely love to hug, high-five, and fist bump thousands of kids!  Yes, I’m deranged—this St. Patrick’s Day was a record high of 80 degrees. Think about being inside of a full-bodied costume and you’ll understand the lunacy!  But with a record crowd it was worth it.

So far all of the spring ABA Booksellers Forums have been well attended —  garnering great comments, conversation, and discussions.  We are hosting the GLIBA/MIBA forum in Naperville on April 20, so I hope to see many of our regional pals that day!  We are inviting many of our local authors, illustrators, and publisher reps from the Chicago area to come to a reception at our Naperville store following the forum.  So please come join us!

Thanks for letting me share a little of what we are doing, and we hope to hear what many of you are doing.  We have all benefitted so much from what we share — those “Ideas That Work”!

Two quick notes: Don’t forget to vote for this year’s ABA Board of Directors candidates. A link to the electronic ballot was sent to main store members in an e-mail from CEO Oren Teicher last Friday. And, there’s still space at ABA’s Children’s Institute [4] at BEA. I hope you will come for a day of great education, favorite authors, bookseller networking, and best practices, all devoted to children’s books and bookselling!

Best to you all,

Becky Anderson, ABA President [5]
Anderson’s Bookshops [6]