Industry Voices - All

Attendance at this year's Northern California Independent Booksellers Association (NCIBA) Trade Show was up, and booksellers who spoke to BTW dubbed it a terrific success. The show was held from Friday, October 5, through Sunday, October 7, at the Oakland Convention Center and Oakland City Center Marriott.

By Rona Brinlee, Owner, The Bookmark in Atlantic Beach, Florida

By Megan Sullivan, Head Buyer, Harvard Bookstore in Cambridge, Massachusetts

By Joe Foster, Ordering Manager, Maria's Bookshop in Durango, Colorado

By Daniel Goldin, General Manager, Harry W. Schwartz Bookshops in Milwaukee

ABFFE President Chris Finan has begun a special Banned Books Week Tour for his new book, From the Palmer Raids to the PATRIOT Act: A History of the Fight for Free Speech in America.

By Cheryl McKeon of Third Place Books in Lake Forest Park, Washington Moving to suburban Seattle from its traditional Portland, Oregon locale, the fall Pacific Northwest Booksellers Association Trade Show attracted enthusiastic booksellers, publishers, and authors to its September 19 - 21 gathering.

The retail sales slump at bookstores continued in June. Preliminary figures recently released by the Bureau of the Census show a decline in retail sales at bookstores in June 2007 of 6.6 percent as compared to June 2006. This was the 12th month in a row that book sales failed to keep pace with the previous years' results. June 2007 bookstore sales are estimated at $1,130 million, compared to sales for the previous June of $1,210 million.

Last November, Pubnet unveiled Instant Response, an alternative to the direct electronic order (DEO) dial-up systems that several publishers began phasing out with the introduction of ISBN-13 in January. Instant Response allows bookstores to place orders and receive backorder acknowledgements, invoices, and advance shipping notices through standardized electronic methods.

This past weekend, several ABA staff members joined front-line booksellers at celebrations marking the release of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. Here are reports filed by ABA COO Oren Teicher at Changing Hands Bookstore in Tempe, Arizona; ABA Information Director Dan Cullen at Other Tiger in Westerly, Rhode Island; and Book Sense Marketing Director Mark Nichols at The Hickory Stick Bookshop in Washington Depot, Connecticut. By ABA COO Oren Teicher at Changing Hands Bookstore