Brick and Mortar Thoughts

Some tips from the Pros on how to operate a successful bookshop.

Objects found inside books

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Oh the tales that can be told of the interesting things found in books… and I don’t mean the words!  People use a wide array of things as bookmarks, including some things that you really question WHY they thought this was a good idea.  There’s three things that I find most commonly in books besides bookmarks: photographs, boarding passes, and credit card receipts.  The credit card receipts are slowly fading away as knucklebuster credit card machines disappear, but they were easily the most common thing I saw for a long time.  Giving me the receipt with your credit card number on it just seems like a bad idea…

Boarding passes are fairly self explanatory.  They grabbed a book on the way on and then stuck the boarding pass of ticket stubs in the book.  Airplane passes are the most common.  I occasionally see train stubs, but usually the serious commuters have a rail pass and aren’t buying individual tickets.  Every now and then I’ll see ferry tickets, but they’re rare.

Photographs are also very common, but like the credit card receipts are fading away.  Photographs usually fall into three categories:  everyone has red eye,  a slightly blurry picture of a dog, or a child being frightened at Disney World. You’d think there couldn’t possibly be THAT many pictures of people being frightened on vacation, but probably about 20% of the photos I find show a kid crying their eyes out at Disney World or Disney Land. You can tell the location by the background architecture.  Ones actually showing the kid fleeing in terror from Mickey Mouse are a bit rarer since its the sort of thing parents keep to torment their grown children with.

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Value Added – The Beguiling knows how, does your Bookshop?

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In this day and age of the big-box bookstore, eBooks, and sites like Amazon it’s hard for the normal brick-and-mortar bookstore to compete. In terms of pricing it’s nigh on impossible to compete. In order to keep the customers coming in the store has to provide a service that a huge store like Barnes-and-Noble or Amazon can’t. The major service, in my opinion, is a sense of community. I mentioned this in my previous article about comic book stores and the advent of digital comic distribution, and it holds true for all bookstores. The release of the final Scott Pilgrim book shows how a bookstore can build a sense of community. Stores all over North America held parties to celebrate the release. At midnight on release day copies were being handed out.

I went to a book release party for this in Toronto, which was organized by The Beguiling, the bookstore where Mr Lee-O’Malley worked while he began the series. I’d never been to a book release party before. I know that many bookstores held them for the release of the Harry Potter books, but I avoided those. The two bars and the restaurant closest to The Beguiling also got in on the act, hosting parties, having DJ’s playing the soundtrack for the forthcoming movie, and holding costume contests. By most accounts about 2000 people showed up. The street was completely shut down from about 9pm until midnight, when the book was actually released. There were fans of the series wandering, having fun, lots were dressed up as characters. The only time I have ever seen this kind of anticipation of a book release was for the later Harry Potter novels. This was the same atmosphere, but with fewer pointy hats and most of the attendees were able to drink.

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A Week in the Life of a Multiple Location Bookshop Owner

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Shane Gottwals www.gottwalsbooks.com Gottwals Books, as of this coming Friday, is a 4-store operation. This would be adventuresome enough if all the stores were within a close proximity, but our newest location in North Carolina is seven hours away. In the past four weeks, here is my typical schedule: Sunday Church, family, and rest. Monday … Read more

Have you experienced shoplifting in your bookshop?

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What do you do with shoplifters?

Bookstore ShopliftingThe first day I opened a young woman with a toddler asked to use the toilet for the little one. I acquiesced and as soon as she left the shop I noticed that some new books by Tess Gerritsen that she has been looking at were also gone. They had nice shiny white covers and were conspicuous by their absence. The visit out the back was a ploy to hide them in the stroller. I vowed to keep an eye out for her but she never came back. I think in hindsight she must have known I would notice they were missing as we had talked about the author.

Then there was the gentleman with a newspaper tucked under his arm; Friday afteroon without a word he strides purposefully down to the classics, pausing only for a moment then striding just as purposefully back out of the shop. Just long enough to tuck a book in with the newspaper under his arm. The next Friday he does the same, the Friday after that as he leaves I stand at the door and with baleful eye watch him cross the street to his bus. He doesn’t come back.

A young man is obviously drunk and tucking books under his denim jacket. As he leaves I say “Excuse me, excuse me” in an embarrassed tone. He is so obvious not even I could miss him. He immediately turns around with a sheepish grin and hands me back the books he has taken. “Please don’t come back” I say.

A young couple come in; they have the look of the drug users who come to the local pharmacy to get their methadone. They have been in before looking for true crime, last time they ended up spending $2 on a couple of magazines. My 15 year old son is helping me this day and pulls out eight books from a series they were looking for. As they leave ‘empty handed’ he says “Mum, I gave them eight books and they only gave me back five”.

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