Modern booksellers are faced with different ways of advertising. Every week, I get besieged by reps who walk in and extoll the virtues of their website, newspaper, local first coupon book, school directory, etc. Every week I make a decision that is usually no. I am not heartless (although the more persistent reps might disagree) — I am being pragmatic.
All retailers have an advertising budget, but increasingly, I’m finding that the most lucrative approach is often to spend less money in a more targeted money. I live in a place where there is one daily paper, the Burlington Free Press. It’s a fine paper, but one that is getting smaller and one that fewer people read in the paper format. Most folks I have know I have shifted to the online version. The alternative weekly paper, Seven Days, is much more widely read, but also prohibitively expensive for a small store. We ran a six-week ad package in Seven Days and lost money because our coupon didn’t bring in enough sales to warrant the expense. One thing I’ve learned about ad money is that there better be a way to track its success in a real way. This is why we do coupons. As the coupons get redeemed we write on them if it was a new customer or an old one and how much they spent. Then, when the campaign is over we see how much customers spent. Sadly, the print campaign just wasn’t worth the money.
I don’t understand web advertising much. I’m not sure how effective it is. I understand the concept of click rates, page views, and all the other things that go along with internet ads, but I’m not sure how well it works for a bookstore. Do people who frequent bookstore spend as much time online as people who would just buy a book at Amazon? That’s hard to know. I’ll be honest, I don’t really like online ads when I’m on a site. I find them annoying and try to minimize my screen so I can only see the article I want to read.
Increasingly, the advertising that works for our store is free. Our Facebook page is like a massive ad for the store. The only money I spend there is the occasional push to get more “likes”, and I’ve never spend more than $100 in a year. People spend time on Facebook and seem to enjoy the posts we put up about books and events. When we have events we ask folks how they heard about the event and increasingly they say Facebook. This is hardly scientific, but it does help me to know where folks are hearing about things.
We have a great thing here called the Front Porch Forum which is a free online neighborhood bulletin board. You can post anything from needing to borrow a power washer to recommendations for dentists to posting bookstore events. More communities have similar things and call them by a plethora of names. We post on there frequently when we have events. Our staff is diverse enough that we get pretty wide coverage of our area (you can only post to your neighborhood forum, so it’s helpful to have friends who can re-post for you in their forum). For whatever reason, these forum emails are among the first people read. You cannot get more local than your neighborhood Front Porch Forum, and these are book readers. Yes, they’re reading the Forum online, but they believe in shopping local. These are our people. We posted three days ago about Jon Muth coming and within hours had 30 RSVPs and that number keeps growing.
The last free advertising we do is our email blast. We have almost 3,000 people on our email list. Not all these people live locally, but all have chosen to be on the list and are therefore letting us know they’re interested in the store. Sometimes the out-of-town people are the book collectors who will order signed copies of books when authors and illustrators come to visit. We do not overwhelm folks with our blasts, because nothing hurts more than folks who want to opt out. These blasts land in email inboxes at good times of the week, usually Thursday or Sunday mornings. It’s very easy to track the effectiveness of these by the number of people who open the blast and then what they click on in the blast. This kind of information, while a little creepy, does help us figure out what kinds of links work best and that’s useful. We also attach a coupon that folks can print out or have on their phone to redeem at events.
So, I’m curious, what advertising has your store found to be the most effective?

Kids and their grandparents shop at the bookstore all the time. Often the grandparents are babysitting, but sometimes they come to the store to scope with the grandkids for birthday presents. This can be a very interesting shopping experience to witness.
Yesterday a lovely grandma and her two charges came in. The boy, Jackson, is turning five in June. They spent a long time looking at a wide range of books. Jackson vacillated between a Star Wars book and a “book about the layers of the earth.” I have to admit, I love it when kids come in, especially ones as young as Jackson, with such specific interests. We had lots of books of for him to look at. Then Grandma did something interesting.
She suggested that she get him one book, Rocks, Fossils and Arrowheads, right now and save the How to Speak Droid  for his birthday. Jackson looked at her and said, “How can I not remember that book?” That was an excellent question. At only four and eleven twelfths (as we determined) he very smartly knew that his memory was excellent. He assured us that no matter what fun things he did between now and his birthday he would know the book was coming to him and it wouldn’t be a surprise, so why not just get it today?
I likened this period of delayed gratification for a little kid to being home all day and making something yummy in a slow cooker: after an hour of cooking you smell yumminess and have to wait seven more hours to eat dinner. Grandma had a good solution after Jackson put on a prodigious display of his memory — he rattled off a list of everything, and I mean everything, he got for Christmas last year, which wowed everyone in the store: she gave him both books. She said she’d give him one less book for his birthday.
If I were her, I’d already have forgotten how many books I gave Jackson, and I’d come back without the grandkids and get him a big ol’ stack for his birthday.
 

I’ve been thinking a lot about small business, its advantages and disadvantages, its role in community, and its role in our cultural point of view.
Many people love the personal aspects of a small local business; they like being known and recognized, they appreciate a shop understanding their likes and preferences. They also appreciate that a local shop’s owners and employees understand, support, and are part of their community. These shops see families come and go, kids grow up, move out, come back and bring in their own children. Small businesses rejoice in their customers’ successes and comfort them in times of sorrow. They ARE the community in which they swim, and there is an Our Town kind of magic in that level of participation, investment, and engagement.
On the other hand, anonymity is impossible in a small business. For one thing, the clerks know what you’re buying. Now, the truth is that we don’t care — in the negative sense —about what you’re buying. So many transactions happen during the course of the day we wouldn’t have time to be  even if we were inclined to, which we aren’t; indie booksellers are fervent advocates of free speech and the rights of reader privacy. And honestly, we won’t even remember what you bought from one visit to the next unless we’ve had a memorable conversation with you about that specific book. And sometimes not even then. But the lack of anonymity can be challenging for a shy customer.
Also, people have moods, and both customer and storekeeper can have a bad day and not hide it as well as they’d like. One bad exchange at a small business can mean the loss of a customer — and possibly that customer’s friends. With an online purchase, the impersonal nature of the transaction distances customers from the vendor. So, someone who hears a terrible thing about the business practices of or inhumane worker treatment by a giant corporation might tut-tut about the news article but continue to shop with that big business. There’s a disconnect.
Small businesses are charming (and occasionally frustrating) exactly because they rest entirely on small groups of individuals with unique quirks and foibles, expertise and passions. We’ve been lucky that our own staff turnover is very low — though high school students will  insist on graduating and going off to college, drat it — so customers have a chance to enjoy continuity in the store over years and get to know our diverse particular strengths. As in any retail establishment, customers gravitate toward the staffers whose reading tastes they best connect with, although I am so gratified to hear praise often about our whole staff. “Everyone here is so helpful!” people will tell me and Josie, and it gladdens our hearts. I actually think the best thing we have ever done as small business owners is to hire well. In small business, staff is everything.
In a very small business like ours, when one colleague is out sick, the whole ship is affected. Fortunately, the very nature of small business means that staff members quickly become family. People pitch in, take extra shifts, pick up the slack for one another. On the rare occasions a truly difficult customer comes in, we play back-up for one another; whichever of us has the most inner resources to deal with a situation steps up to bat. We also laugh and cry together, celebrate all the personal triumphs and mourn losses together. Small businesses are a microcosm of our community.
For some, the nature of corporate retail is comforting, if only in its universal predictability. Those retail spaces are slickly designed and sometimes feel restfully impersonal and disconnected from our own lives. As a customer myself, I don’t always want a conversation with a sales clerk, and we try to train our staff to respect people’s varying levels of wanting help versus wanting to be left alone. But mostly, people coming in to shop at a small business do want at least some assistance, and are so grateful when they find engaged and resourceful people on the other end.
I don’t mean to canonize small businesses; there is always room for improvement, and not everyone in retail is cut out to be working face-to-face with customers. But you can bet that anyone involved in a small business is working extremely hard, juggling about 1200 balls, and cares about every aspect of that business and its customers. The very personal nature of small business is its backbone and fiber and sinew, its humanness and vulnerability, its Herculean strength and its Achilles heel. We wouldn’t want our world to be a cookie-cutter nation. Small businesses are full of personality and punch, and I love being part of one, warts and all. Maybe especially because of the warts.

Do you have a small business in your community that you can’t imagine doing without? Feel free to share an anecdote about your favorite small store here.

I had to come out of my blog ‘vacation’ to post about a form of fantastic activism that fills my heart with joy. When creative people see a need and turn it into action, amazing things happen. The conversation about the lack of diversity in children’s books and in the publishing field itself has reached a groundswell, and this week, the We Need Diverse Books campaign was born. I think it may just be the tipping point we have been hoping for.
In the interest of spreading the word as widely as possible, I’m simply going to reproduce the entire useful text of the campaign’s appeal so that you all can pour your efforts into supporting it as you like. Authors and illustrators, editors and booksellers, teachers and librarians are all getting involved. Here at ShelfTalker, we will of course continue to blog about this topic, and will step up our efforts to introduce you to fabulous books featuring main characters of color and diversity of all kinds.
Here’s a link to my World Full of Color database, highlighting more than 1,000 children’s and YA books featuring main characters of color where race is NOT the driving force of the story. Feel free to share this with anyone who might find it helpful: parents, educators, librarians, kids.
Let’s fill bookshelves across the country with a world full of color! Our children deserve it. They need it. We all need it.
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All of the following text comes from the WE NEED DIVERSE BOOKS CAMPAIGN Tumblr:
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Recently, there’s been a groundswell of discontent over the lack of diversity in children’s literature. The issue is being picked up by news outlets like these two pieces in the NYT, CNN, EW, and many more. But while we individually care about diversity, there is still a disconnect. BEA’s BookCon recently announced an all-white-male panel of “luminaries of children’s literature,” and when we pointed out the lack of diversity, nothing changed.
Now is the time to raise our voices into a roar that can’t be ignored. Here’s how:
On May 1st at 1pm (EST), there will be a public call for action that will spread over 3 days. We’re starting with a visual social media campaign using the hashtag #WeNeedDiverseBooks. We want people to tweet, Tumblr, Instagram, Facebook, blog, and post anywhere they can to help make the hashtag go viral.
For the visual part of the campaign:

• Take a photo holding a sign that says “We need diverse books because ___________________________.” Fill in the blank with an important, poignant, funny, and/or personal reason why this campaign is important to you.
• The photo can be of you or a friend or anyone who wants to support diversity in kids’ lit. It can be a photo of the sign without you if you would prefer not to be in a picture. Be as creative as you want! Pose the sign with your favorite stuffed animal or at your favorite library. Get a bunch of friends to hold a bunch of signs.
• However you want to do it, we want to share it! There will be a Tumblr at http://weneeddiversebooks.tumblr.com/ that will host all of the photos and messages for the campaign. Please submit your visual component by May 1stto weneeddiversebooks@yahoo.com with the subject line “photo” or submit it right on our Tumblr page here and it will be posted throughout the first day.
• Starting at 1:00pm (EST) the Tumblr will start posting and it will be your job to reblog, tweet, Facebook, or share wherever you think will help get the word out.
• The intent is that from 1pm EST to 3pm EST, there will be a nonstop hashtag party to spread the word. We hope that we’ll get enough people to participate to make the hashtag trend and grab the notice of more media outlets.
• The Tumblr will continue to be active throughout the length of the campaign, and for however long we need to keep this discussion going, so we welcome everyone to keep emailing or sending in submissions even after May 1st.

On May 2nd, the second part of our campaign will roll out with a Twitter chat scheduled for 2pm (EST) using the same hashtag. Please use #WeNeedDiverseBooks at 2pm on May 2nd and share your thoughts on the issues with diversity in literature and why diversity matters to you.
On May 3rd, 2pm (EST), the third portion of our campaign will begin. There will be a Diversify Your Shelves initiative to encourage people to put their money where their mouth is and buy diverse books and take photos of them. Diversify Your Shelves is all about actively seeking out diverse literature in bookstores and libraries, and there will be some fantastic giveaways for people who participate in the campaign! More details to come!
We hope that you will take part in this in any way you can. We need to spread the word far and wide so that it will trend on Twitter. So that media outlets will pick it up as a news item. So that the organizers of BEA and every big conference and festival out there gets the message that diversity is important to everyone. We hope you will help us by being a part of this movement.

• diversity
• poc
• poc authors
• change
• BEA
• Bookcon
• weneeddiversebooks

I usually get ready early for Book Expo, mapping out my educational sessions and which publishers I’d like to visit. This year I’ve looked at the schedule and something feels missing to me. I pondered for a while and looked at the ABA website more thoroughly and noticed that this year seems more about networking and less about education.
I missed BEA last year and didn’t go to Winter Institute because the store couldn’t afford the airfare to Seattle. So, this BEA I’m ready to dig in and go get some education. Hell, after missing these events, I’m even ready for another go-round with the infamous-always-offered 2% Solution class where we all learned that if we just managed our finances 2% better through cost of goods sold, maximizing returns, etc., our stores would succeed. What’s become clear to me is that this year is BEA is more about meeting the folks behind the scenes in the publishing world. This makes sense, but it does make things harder.
Here’s my issue: it seems now that Winter Institute has really taken off, so  this is where the bulk of the ABA educational opportunities lie. To some degree this makes sense. Better to have three totally focused days on education, rather than divide our time between education and trying to see the vast show floor. But, as someone coming from a small store with not a lot of staff, who wants some education mixed in with looking at new books, having two things I need to leave work for seems unfair and expensive. Since leaving the store in January is hard for me for a variety of reasons, I always feel like I get more bang for my buck by going to BEA.
I was perusing the session lists and one session in particular caught my attention: The Future of Bricks and Mortar Bookselling. I was thinking this might offer some hands-on ideas that I could use back at home. I noticed that there’s not one bookseller on the panel: there is someone from a publisher, from Kobo, the book buyer from Target, and the head of ABA. This sends a message that perhaps the organizers of this session have conceded the future for bricks and mortar stores is dim at best.
There are other sessions that have caught my eye. As always the chance to meet with publishers is a great hook of BEA and this year there are several good chances. ABA’s Meet the Editors seems like a great opportunity to talk with the folks responsible for the trends we see on our shelves. And it would be great to get a sense of what’s coming down the pike in the next year or two. The ABC/CBC Illustrator Studio Tour is always fun. I love seeing how artists work and what their studios are like. It’s always magical to me to spend time with them. The session about the James Patterson’s Bookseller Pledge hold appeal insofar as I’d like to know how to get a grant, since the application process seems vague at best.
Perennial favorite session include the Speed Dating session and the Author/Illustrator Tea, where booksellers get to meet authors and illustrators. I’ve been in bookselling for 18 years and I never tire of meeting these talented people. Editor’s Buzz panels for Young Adult books and Middle Grade books is enormously helpful. I love finding out what they’re excited about and why.
There is a session on social media and Hootsuite, and since I don’t even know what Hootsuite is, I’m thinking maybe I should go. The other session that looks good is the Common Core Update. I think we all need this one as there is still confusion in my area about how the Common Core is actually working in schools.
So, booksellers, are you going to Book Expo this year? If you are, what about it excites you?

Every bookstore has the daily challenge of tidying up after customers, especially little customers. One of the joys of owning a bookstore is seeing people of all ages browsing the shelves and finding books they want to look at. People try to be helpful by putting their looked-at books away; mostly they do a great job of this, but sometimes, it’s more of a crap shoot and it’s our job as booksellers to put them back where they belong.
The joy of a bookstore is everything is alphabetically arranged by author. It isn’t really rocket science, although I will freely admit that the non-fiction section with its various shelves of subjects can stymie this seasoned bookseller at times. I’ve learned some things that are helpful when trying to re-alphabetize the store.
In the adult section, most misplaced books are going to be eye level or higher. Adults tend to put things back in a way that’s the easier for them and this makes sense. Easier often winds up at eye level, with books placed on top of the books on the shelf. This sort of person actually makes it easier for me to see what’s awry. They are acknowledging that they think the book goes back where they’ve placed it, but aren’t totally confident of its resting place on the shelf, so they leave it near where it should be. This is actually helpful. It’s very easy to scan to the shelves for books on their sides and return them to their rightful home. The lower shelves of the adult section are almost never out of order, it’s the top two that are the challenge.
The children’s section is the exact opposite. Yes, books wind up on their sides all the time, but more than likely what happens in picture books is testament to the size of the browsers. Little ones like to help put things away at the store just as they do at home. They don’t yet understand alphabetical order; they’re not reading yet. They just know if they put the book back on the shelf they’ve done the right thing, because that’s how clean-up works at home. So, I’ve learned that if you’ve only got a few minutes to alphabetize the picture books, always start with the bottom shelf.
All manner of bad things happen on the bottom shelf of picture and board books. Books are put back upside down, torn books often wind up stuffed in among the others, books are out of order because they are often from the stack the family was reading and the little one helped before the parent could say, “Sweetie, just leave the pile.” Every bookseller I know would much rather have a stack to shelve than a try to figure out where the books might have been mis-shelved.
I like it when kids help put away books with guidance. But there is a constant challenge of things not being put back right so I can’t find something later when a customer is looking for that particular book. It’s all a balancing act. I do love little toddlers returning each rubber bath toy to its rightful home. Proudly, they take a toy (it’s always one at a time) and gently place it in the basket and then repeat for as long as it takes. I will usually show slightly older kids the easiest way to return books to the shelf: use both hands, check that the jacket is all the way down and then gently place the book on the shelf. I don’t worry about alphabetically much with the little ones but older kids are pretty good about doing it right.
So, the next time you’re in a busy bookstore and their computer says they have one copy of a picture book and cannot find it, be patient, it’s probably on the bottom shelf.

The struggle of any small business is to get other small businesses to buy their products. Bookstore owners are besieged daily with people who think their sidelines would be just perfect for the store. I have to admit, I have become somewhat cranky about these solicitations. So, here is a list that I hope folks will find helpful in approaching bookstores to carry their products.
– Do not cold call the bookstore. I like that just a bit more than folks coming in and expecting me to stop what I’m doing and listen to their pitch. One vendor recently called and tried to pitch me posters that he thought would be a good fit here. I asked if he could email and he said, “Nope, don’t do it.” Then I inquired about the web site and was met with, “Nope, don’t have one.” So, let me understand: you expect me to buy art sight unseen based only your description of what the product looks like? Really??
– If you send an email please include all the product information. Do not send an email that mentions a website without including a link to the it. I know this is a silly point, but being able to click on a link is easy and get right to the website is far more likely to get me look at what you’re trying to sell.
– Follow up less frequently than you think you need to. If it’s been two weeks and no one has gotten in touch with you, then it’s okay to call. Then let it be. I know this is frustrating, but here’s the thing: if something catches a buyer’s eye they will deal with it fairly immediately. Calling every day (yes, this happens) is a sure-fire way to make me not want to buy your products.
– Respect my time. If I do talk with you on the phone, please listen if I’m trying to gently tell you that your silicon spatula line for children is just isn’t a good fit for us.
– Do your homework. Go to my website and see what kind of store we are. While I am not likely to need spatulas, cool 3-D bookmarks might be an excellent fit.
– Lastly, do not mail a sample unless I’ve expressed interest in your product. I don’t want you to spend the money on giving me a free sample and shipping unless it’s something I really want.

There’s not much delayed gratification for privileged Americans these days. Technology has spoiled us so much that we feel frustrated if a website takes a few extra seconds to load or we have to bake a potato in the oven instead of the microwave. The few things we can’t access 24/7 via the internet — or influence the timing of — include tides, the weather, the motion of the planets, and someone else’s creative process.
I’m as much a product of modern convenience as the next person—maybe even more so, since I grew up with a Dad who leapt to test out the next new gadget or gizmo: Pong, laser discs, holographic sculptures, Space Food Sticks. (I know!) So waiting is not always my strong suit. When I discover something terrific — the His Fair Assassin series by Robin LaFevers, say, or Netflix’s Orange Is the New Black, or, this week’s yearning for book 2 of Sally Green’s Half Bad series — I want the next installment right away. Internally, I’m stamping my impatient feet.
Soon, we’ll be able to 3D print a new pair of shoes for those feet right at home. But we still won’t be able to rush an author, and that’s a good thing. Even though it’s hard to wait, there’s something important about delayed gratification. We value what we wait for. We get to experience the deliciousness of anticipation. And waiting is a humbling reminder that we are not the architects of our own little worlds, as much as we may try to be. Back in the glory days of buildup to a new Harry Potter book, kids would complain about the wait for each volume. Their desire for the new story was so intensely felt, they would vibrate with it. I’d say, “Think of it this way: You are the only generation that gets to experience this excitement. The midnight parties and predictions about what will happen to the characters… this worldwide anticipation… will never happen again in the history of the universe, and you get to be here for it!” I don’t know how much it helped assuage the agonized longing, but it was true, and I think at least some of the older kids appreciated it. (Of course, I was also playing to the desire for specialness, their own echoes of Harry-Potter destiny, and don’t think I didn’t know it. But, it was still true.) It will be the equivalent of the old codger whining at kids about having to walk two miles to school in a blizzard with no shoes. “Back in my day, we had to wait three years before we could read The Order of the Phoenix. THREE YEARS!”
So I was extremely pleased to suffer at the end of the aforementioned Half Bad by Sally Green. I had picked up the ARC a while ago, and put it down for a bit because it starts off dark, and I wasn’t sure I was up for reading about a maltreated boy who is kept in an outdoor cage. I am often drawn to dark books, but cruelty has never been easy for me to stomach, so I kept my distance. But the bookseller buzz was so strong — there really is nothing as effective as word of mouth! — I gave it another chance, and this time, I was hooked. Without going into too much spoiler material, the main character is a young male witch coded as a dangerous Half White Half Black Witch. (The full implications of the racial overtones built into those terms, “white” and “black,” remain to be seen; we suspect that the maligned Black Witches may be persecuted than persecuting, but by the end of book 1, while we know that many of the White Witches are truly evil, we still don’t know for sure what the story is with the Black Witches.)
This blog post is not intended to be a book review but a discussion of frustration, so I will end here and merely ask, How do you approach a new series? Do you wait until all the books (or TV episodes) are out before even beginning? Or do you, like me, enjoy the anticipation? And what, pray tell, are you waiting for right now?
 

The advent of new technology has been a boon for the bookstore as well as a liability. Smartphones make it easy to communicate with staffers when I’ve forgotten something that needs doing. They allow me to jot down notes when I’m away from the store and more importantly, they help customers remember book titles. The dark side of the phone is they can take photos of books that customers will order elsewhere.
Being able to communicate with staffers in a way that doesn’t involve the phone works really well for me. Sometimes, I have a quick, non-urgent item I just need to share that doesn’t merit a phone call; I know if I wait till I’m back at the store it will be lost from my memory. Staffers will text me similar things. Often, when I’m not at work, I’m not really able to speak on the phone, so texting allows us to stay in touch. Yesterday, for example I was taking a four-mile walk at Shelburne Farms where the cell phone reception is bumpy at best, but texts come through just fine. In three texts, Sandy and I  solved the problem of the eight book Police Exam special order efficiently with smiley faces, no less.
Customers use their phones as a way to remember what books they want to order. Often, there are copious pages of notes with book titles or jottings of when and where they heard about a book. Being able to dictate often results in notes like this: Fresh Air, Monday, Prison book. That is more than enough to go to find a book, and since the notes are automatically dated, it’s so much simpler to find the titles. Sometimes, people bring us photos of books they’ve seen elsewhere. That’s enormously helpful, although I always feel bad if they’ve taken a picture at another indie. I never feel bad if it’s from a chain store or Costco. Any device that helps customer retain book information is a win-win for everyone.
The down side of a smartphone at the bookstore is when people take pictures of books they want to order on Amazon. Or, more stingily, books they’re ordering on Amazon while in my store. Some people are brazen about it, clearly having no compunction about using our store as their Amazon showroom. Others are at least a little bit sheepish about it and try to be more discreet. It’s hard to not react when it’s clear someone is photographing book covers in the store or scanning QR codes. I don’t say anything, but I do try to notice what books seem to be getting the most cell phone activity. I do wonder, sometimes about generating my own QR code labels and putting them on books so customers would be led right back to my website.
Lastly, the beauty of cell phones at the store is getting photos from staffers about cute things at the store. Usually, it’s a puppy or a really cute baby holding a book. But Tuesday, our youngest staffers were working together and Laura texted that there was $2.91 postage due on a poster tube. She wanted me to know that she paid the postage from petty cash. I said it was all right and then I got this photo texted to me. Not only did that poster cost us $3, it’s enormous. And it’s a promo for the movie. But it was funny and all because everything about it could be shared, and that’s a good way to use a phone.

Recently, I wrote a blog post (Are We Rushing Kids Out of Picture Books?) about the way children are pushed toward chapter books at younger and younger ages. The topic struck a nerve; thoughtful comments poured in. Then at the ABC Children’s Institute in San Antonio earlier this month, I was on a panel discussing this topic (Selling Picture Books in the Wake of Age Compression) with several other children’s booksellers and librarians, and the room was overflowing and the conversation energetic. Clearly, this is a subject people feel passionate about!
The panelists were (including me): Elizabeth Bluemle, Flying Pig Bookstore (Shelburne, VT); Maureen Palacios, Once Upon a Time (Montrose, CA); Ann Seaton, Hicklebee’s (San Jose, CA); Marianne Follis, Ph.D, senior librarian at Valley Ranch Library (Irving, TX); moderated by Valerie Koehler, Blue

 Willow Bookshop (Houston, TX). 
I thought I would share the terrific list of suggestions made by the panelists and the attendees. Because the discussion was rapid and I was writing by hand, I couldn’t attribute each suggestion to its bookseller, so thank you to all of the fabulous folks who shared their expertise and great ideas!
Also, the ABC made a wonderful poster that bookstores (and schools and libraries) might want to use, as a handout for customers and staff members.
I’ve divided the suggestions into categories: Talking Points, Display Ideas, Staff Training, and Quotables. Please feel free to print out this bulleted list and share it with your bookselling, library, and teaching colleagues if you think it would be helpful.
INDEPENDENT BOOKSELLERS’ TIP SHEET: PICTURE BOOKS ARE FOR ALL AGES 
Customer Education and Handselling Tips
The term “picture book” simply refers to a book format in which art and text depend on one another for the full meaning of the book to emerge. Picture books span a wide range of intended ages. There are picture books for babies, picture books for just about every age of childhood, and picture books for adults.
Though they may seem simple, picture books often contain more sophisticated language than chapter books, because they are intended for fluent readers to read aloud, not for beginning readers to sound out. So an adult trying to move a child toward a more challenging read might in fact find that challenge right there in the picture book section.
It’s very effective to let adults know that teachers use picture books with older kids all the time in classroom settings. In addition to sparking various kinds of social studies conversations and explorations of art and the interaction of text and art, picture books can teach kids a lot about story structure, narrative, rhetorical devices, voice, and storytelling mastery.
Wow them with science: A child development expert friend of mine said that picture books connect our visual and auditory cortex with our frontal lobe in a way that even illustrated chapter books don’t. For example, the illustrations in a picture book often introduce an unwritten subplot, tell mini-stories not in the text, or actually contradict the text — inviting the brain to make connections in a way that chapter books generally don’t.
Picture books are excellent for social-emotional development. A picture book can be the fastest way to spark a conversation or get to the meat of a topic with older kids.
Relatability is crucial; often children are rushed away from books that are developmentally appropriate for their abilities and interests, and into books they won’t get nearly as much out of. (One bookseller asks children who pick chapter books that are meant for older kids to promise to re-read the book when they are older, and some kids have come back and said, “It’s a totally different book now!”)
A 32-page picture book may cost the same as a 350-page novel, but a picture book is read over and over again, and each time there may be something new to discover. The more reading a children does, especially of books with rich language, the more fluent he or she becomes as a reader.
Don’t give away your child’s board books too soon; they are perfect for when a child becomes a beginning independent reader, and he or she can read those old favorites to littler siblings, to pets or stuffed animals.
The language in picture books is often quite rich and sophisticated, exposing children to the joys of language, vocabulary, cadence, and to the many ways a story can be spun.
The same is true of picture book art. Nowhere else in literature are readers of all ages exposed to such a variety of artistic styles and examples of visual expression.
Wordless picture books: suggest that older siblings ‘read’ wordless picture books to younger siblings.
Author Aaron Becker (Journey; Quest) has written a wonderful guide to ‘reading’ wordless picture books aloud.
One of the marks of a fluent reader is the ability to read all kinds of literature, both “harder” and “easier.” They have different purposes and varied appeal, speaking to a child’s imagination, challenging thinking, introducing new ideas, entertaining and delighting, comforting, and sparking creativity.
How many kids get turned off reading because they’re pushed too fast away from the books they truly love?
Humor trumps all. Find the funny intelligent book, the funny artistic book, the funny musical book, etc., and your customer will be hooked.
A terrific article in the May/June 2011 issue of the Horn Book finds author/artist Marla Frazee and her editor, Allyn Johnston, discussing “Why We’re Still in Love with Picture Books (Even Though They’re Supposed to be Dead.” Also, the Horn Book has many interviews with artists; sharing these with parents can help them better appreciate the treasure trove of visual literacy picture books provide.
Quotables
“A picture book is not an age. It’s a form.”
“It’s never too late for a great picture book.”
Call the longer, older-aimed picture books “picture novellas.”
For adults wanting to steer their children toward a chapter book that is simply too old for their child developmentally: “Just because they CAN read a book doesn’t mean they SHOULD.” (Books resonate with different ages differently.) OR: “They can read it, but they will get so much more out of it when they’re [perfect age for book].”
Again, for adults steering their children away from age- and interest-appropriate picture books: “Relatability is the single biggest factor for a book’s success with a child.”
For younger children wanting to choose a chapter book because it’s thick and looks like what their older siblings/friends are reading: “That’s [chapter book] a good book to carry around, but this [picture book] is a great book to read!”
“We aren’t gatekeepers, but guides.” Our job is to help children find the books they will love deeply, the right books at the right time. (One great strategy a bookseller used for discouraging a too-young kid from reading The Hunger Games was to ask, “Are you into politics?” At six or seven, the answer was a resounding NO. That approach helps place the decision in the child’s hands, with a little help.)
Staff Training (for General Bookstores as well as Children’s-Only)
New staff training — the store tour always ends in the picture book section.
One store has daily story time; new staff (in all sections, not just children’s) must watch every story time for two weeks.
Staffers are encouraged to take a stack of picture books home every single day. You can’t recommend what you haven’t read.
Storytime for staff — take time for some impromptu readings of picture books during the work day.
Staff read picture books out loud occasionally at the front counter; it always sells books.
As you receive new picture books, take time to share them with colleagues.
Everyone on staff must spend a half hour per week in the children’s department.
At staff meetings, have each bookseller bring a favorite picture book to ‘handsell’ to colleagues.
Write reviews from the proofs of picture books pre-publication; that way, the buyer’s enthusiasm for the picture book is fresh. The shelftalker will help familiarize other staff with the books when it eventually comes in.
Display or Event Ideas That Have Worked Well
Staff Picks Comfort Books: Make a display of staff picture-book comfort reads (i.e., picture books read by adults) with shelftalkers from staff members explaining why they love and turn to this book in times of stress or sorrow.
Tie in with current events or culture: When Cosmos aired on PBS, for example, one bookstore did extremely well with a display on space-related picture books. Another store did an entire window display on picture books featuring numbers in some way; this display sold amazingly well.
Great All-Family Read-Aloud Picks: This display highlights picture books that appeal to ALL ages, not just the family’s youngest members.
Some stores arrange picture books by age range: baby books; preschool to kindergarten; elementary age.
Pair a picture book with a novel for children’s in-store book groups.
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Please feel free to share some of the tips that work well in your store (or library)!