News - Bookselling

Bucking an uncertain economy, bookstore sales for December closed out the year 2001 on a strong note. Preliminary December sales of $2,291 million were 9.6 percent ahead of the $2,090 million sales for December of 2000. Bookstore sales continued to outperform overall retail. Preliminary overall retail sales of $339 billion amounted to a slim 3.0 percent gain for December over the $329 billion in sales recorded the previous December.

At the site of the venerable Chatterton’s Bookshop, closed in 1994 after the death of its owner, is Los Angeles's five-year-old Skylight Books, the result of great production, directing, casting, and location.

Thanks to a great outpouring of booksellers’ recommendations, we were able to compile a fantastic Poetry 76 Top Ten. The flier will go on press this week; the pad of fliers will go into the March "white box," and they'll get to you in time for April poetry displays.

In conjunction with BookExpo America, a number of organizations have come together to launch a campaign to encourage New York City residents to join a citywide book group. Earlier this month representatives from the organizations voted to select as the featured title the novel Native Speaker by Chang-Rae Lee, (Riverhead Books).

On Tuesday, February 12, approximately 20 booksellers attended a Booksellers Forum held at the Westford Regency, in Westford, Massachusetts, from 4:00 p.m. - 6:00 p.m. The Booksellers Forum followed a meeting of the New England Booksellers Association Advisory Council.

The number of consumers redeeming Book Sense gift certificates grew at a prodigious rate in 2001, and that trend continued into the first month of January 2002 -- with a record number of consumers redeeming gift certificates at independent bookstores around the country. This is according to recent Book Sense figures charting store-to-store gift certificate redemptions (the figures do not include gift certificates that were purchased and redeemed in the same store).

Special ABA programming on Saturday, May 4, at the 2002 BookExpo America (BEA) in New York City will offer a wide range of networking opportunities with other booksellers, and a chance to learn the latest on ABA programs from association staff.

Virginia Hamilton, an internationally renowned and award-winning author of children’s literature, died February 19, 2002, in Dayton, Ohio. She had been ill with cancer for a number of years. Hamilton was 65.

Based on a February 12 visit to the American International Toy Fair 2002, it appears that designing a successful plaything this year involves selecting popular toys and games from three or four decades ago and making them edible or covering them with licensed brand or team names. Another popular option is creating something kids can play together with their parents, or even better, with their grandparents, in the safety of their own homes dressed in facsimiles of the uniforms of firefighters and police officers (also known as community workers).

Avin Mark Domnitz, ABA CEO, will be holding three financial sessions through March and April 2002 in conjunction with ABA’s 2002 Spring Bookseller Forums across the country. The sessions, "Basic Bookstore Finances," will discuss operating within a system of financial controls to help predict performance and measure outcomes against those predictions, and cash flow control. Attendees will receive a computer disk with worksheets, which will help them integrate the session’s ideas into their everyday business.