One of the questions that any business has is how effective is the money being spent on ‘advertising’? Does it result in sales to keep the entire enterprise – the advertising, the payroll, the rent, the orders – going? Bill and I were always wondering how effective our old red postcards or our quarterly newsletters were. Did the time and expense of producing them pay for themselves, let alone anything else? Our ealier inventory systems did not have a mailing list attached to them, so there was no clear way to know who on the mailing list was buying from us. Our current system, however, does allows that, and it is time to begin using it to answer this larger question.
As these days become more and more challenging to booksellers, between the overall economy and the unsettling rise in e-book sales, we need to know that the efforts we put into our various ‘mailings’ are resulting in sales. After all, this newzine, the quarterly newsletters, the blog, the website, the recommendations you get from us in the shop – all of that has to be supported by you buying books. If you’re using what we do but not supporting it by buying from us, believe me, it will all go away.
We have 1300 or so of you who get this newzine every week. Starting this week, we’re going to begin culling that list, matching it to who has been supporting us. If you’ve not bought from us in this calendar year, we’ll be forced to conclude that you are not paying for what you are using and drop you from the newzine list. Similarly, we’re close to sending the Winter newsletter to the printer and posting it on the website. If you subscribe, you’ll continue getting it. But if you’ve been getting it in the mail and haven’t bought from us this year, we’re no longer going to swallow the expense of sending it to you in the mail.
In a way, independent businesses – booksellers or boutiques – are not unlike public radio or public television. If you want to continue having them around when you want them, you have to support them. If you like to have our ‘mailings’ as a resource but you buy only e-books, and those from somewhere else, then you’re going to lose that resource one way or another. If you want to have our ‘mailings’ as a resource, you have to support us by buying from those who produce them.
Simple, stark and clear. If you like what we do, you have to support it by buying from us. If you don’t, you’ll lose what you use. ~ JB
Those of us who work in bookstores will tell you we're a resource. When you work in any bookstore, not just a specialty shop, you're expected to be a knowledgeable about everything, from being able to identify a book with few clues ("it was blue, I think, and it had murder in the title, and the author's name began with an "S". Or maybe it was red, and the character's name began with a "P". I dunno, can you help me?"), to when will XX’s next book be out, to where to get a good meal, to how the buses/trains/taxis work, to the most pressing - "Do you have a restroom?". And we're cool with that. It's a challenge and that keeps us on our toes.
But there are times when our talents are exploited.
We all love a bargain and we all comparison shop. It's in our natures. But the service we provide here depends on you.
Have you ever noticed that Barnes & Noble have their own price stickers on their books? Did you ever ask yourself why? Let me explain.
There are all manner of electronic applications out there now, including a new one by Amazon, that allow you to come into the store, visit with us and get our recommendations, then scan the bar code on back of the book we’ve spent time talking to you about, and your gizmo will tell you how much it'll cost to get from Amazon. The Barnes & Noble bar codes won't do that for you; they aren't analagous to the publisher's bar code so you can't just scan-and-snoop. Oh sure, you can look it up by title or author, but that means actually typing in all the information which most people are disinclined to do. It's a lot of work. It's a self-preservation move by B&N, and we totally get it.
But we're too small to print our own price code labels; it's not cost effective. So we've had to just suck it up and accept that some people will simply use our knowledge without compensation.
Here's the problem, though, and I'll bet you've already figured it out.
If people keep doing that -- using our knowledge to buy books elsewhere -- pretty soon we're not going to be here to provide that knowledge any more. We can't change the prices charged for books, or even some e-books, because the price is what it is. We can't offer loss leaders like the Big Box stores because we don't have their kind of profit margin or corporate backing. No mom-and-pop shop does. What we offer instead is personal insight, a genuine desire to help you find the book that suits you, and a love of what we do. To us, books aren't simply "units" to be sold, they're friends.
So that's the problem. People want a bargain. Who doesn't? But sometimes you have to pay a bit more for quality and service, and that's us. When someone comes in, mines our knowledge and then spends their money elsewhere, they're stealing from us, in a sense. It's seriously frustrating.
The same thing goes for our newsletters and our weekly ezine. Granted, people pay for the newsletter, but what you pay for a subscription really doesn't cover the cost of it, not when you factor in printing costs, ever increasing mailing costs, and the sheer amount of time it takes to assemble them. Right now, JB's working on four different iterations of newsletters: the upcoming Winter one, next Spring, next Summer, and yes, next Fall's already. We all contribute, we all edit, each one's a time consuming effort. And when you get yours and then order from us, it's all worthwhile. Thank you!
But if you get it and then order from somewhere else, you're simply using us. That's not something we feel comfortable in encouraging.
The same is true of our weekly ezines. They're intended to be informative and interesting and entertaining, but they're still mostly designed to get you to buy books from us. We're a business; that's why we're here. Yes, we do this for love, but we have to be able to pay the rent too. We need to be using our time and energy most effectively, and that means talking with and helping out the people who help us back.
We want you to be a part of our shop for a long, long time. But the time has come for us to re-evaluate who we're talking to, who's in this with us and who's simply using our knowledge, time, effort and love. It's gotta be a two-way street, my friends. That's the only way any relationship can work! ~ Fran
