{"id":735,"date":"2010-04-01T08:15:44","date_gmt":"2010-04-01T13:15:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/rbicmsblog.reedbusiness.com\/elogic_660000266\/2010\/04\/01\/bea-start-your-planning-early\/"},"modified":"2010-04-01T08:15:44","modified_gmt":"2010-04-01T13:15:44","slug":"bea-start-your-planning-early","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/?p=735","title":{"rendered":"BEA: Start Your Planning Early (April 1 edition)"},"content":{"rendered":"

It’s that time of year again, folks: BEA looms and there are some exciting (and sobering) new educational sessions in 2010; we’ve got the inside scoop. Conference rooms fill quickly, so we thought it might be useful to help children’s booksellers get a jump on this year’s planning.
\nSee you in NYC!
\n***
\nDay of Education Offerings:<\/strong>
\nServing the “Twoddler” Reader: Issues and Best Practices <\/strong> (Room 1E12)
\nThe Twoddler is the largest untapped market in children’s books right now. Join our panel discussion of how this little person between the ages of 3-5 is really the decision-maker when it comes to which books the family will purchase. In this workshop you’ll get the tools you need to encourage these powerhouse pre-readers to target their tantrums toward expensive hardcovers. Rethinking eye-level placement: 24″-36″ is your new best friend. Effective marketing and containment strategies will be discussed, including the use of favorite costumed characters and bossy older siblings to keep these twoddlers in the section they belong.
\nThe Nuts & Bolts of Children’s Bookselling: Roundtable Discussions<\/strong> (Room 1E12dada)
\nJoin us for frank conversation about the day-to-day operational issues that we rarely get a chance to discuss in a conference environment. Learn the best ways to clean spit-up off dust jackets, lift ground gum out of carpets, and retrieve expensive sidelines that have been “stored” under bookcases by curious children. That noise you hear is a ripped book, so get up and make them pay for it. Tips for when story hour turns into a siege. Tips on what to say to the parent whose child has just wiped his nose on a copy of Knuffle Bunny<\/em>. Also: the benefits of Goo-Gone and other safe substitutes for soap to use on dirty hands when parents refuse to take their kids to the bathroom. Learn time-trusted techniques for getting through the day when you just don’t like kids anymore. Bonus: why crying toddlers are bad for business.
\nMedium- and Large-Store Roundtable<\/strong> (Room 1E12 SW)
\nAn interactive session for those who own or manage large stores. Sit at a table with seven other booksellers and listen to the loudest person dominate the discussion about why their store is better than yours.
\nSmall- and Truly Wee-Store Roundtable<\/strong> (Room 1E12SWEscalator)
\nA moderated session geared for owner-managers in smaller stores. Why not take a two-hour break and hear tales of woe as you share or learn about the challenges of owning a small indie in today’s market? Discover why publicists chuckle when they receive your author request grids. Leave feeling lucky you still have keys to your store. Tissues available for purchase (via agency model), along with DVDs of Mighty Mouse <\/em>and a custom adaptation of a Dr. Seuss classic, The 500 Hats of the Small Indie Owner<\/em>.
\nIt’s in the Payroll<\/strong> (Room 1E12 A)
\nThis brief workshop will outline ways how all bookstores, from tiny to large, can offer less and less to their employees in an effort to remain open and compete in the marketplace. The role of barter for staff will be thoroughly discussed.
\nThe Business of Accepting Credit and Debit Cards<\/strong> (Room 1E12 34DD)
\nIn this session you’ll learn why taking credit and debit cards is important since no one ever has cash, even for that fifty-cent eraser. Learn more efficient swiping techniques and ways to get that slow second receipt to print out before the customer starts tapping her pen on the counter. Strategies for helping customers who just can’t remember their PIN are also handled in this session, as well as the top five alternatives to rolling your eyes during difficult transactions.
\nIndieBound Workshop<\/strong>
\nThis educational session focuses on how you can train your customers that IndieBound actually refers to books and not bondage. After a tour of educational materials available for download, strategies for covering all your windows with banners and posters will be thoroughly examined.
\nIndieCommerce Demo<\/strong> (Room 1E12 Right Corner)
\nThis session is aimed at bookstore owners and managers who don’t yet know what a website is.
\nIt’s a Wrap: Video Workshop <\/strong>
\nBring a Handycam and your sense of humor! Come prepared to learn how videos \u2014which you will never actually make; I mean, come on, who are we kidding?\u2014could, but won’t, boost sales at your store. Experience the thrill of discovering yet another new social networking opportunity to feel guilty about neglecting.
\nSuccession Planning: Valuing Your Business<\/strong> (Room 1E12$)
\nWhat to do when you really want to get out of the game, but no one will buy your bookstore. How to cook the books so your brother-in-law thinks your business is a profit center. Ways to make long-time customers think that you can read all day long and succeed as an indie bookseller.
\nThe New Reality: Alternative Business Models for Independent Bookstores<\/strong> (Room 1E12 Sidewalk)
\nThis panel discussion focuses on job retraining for bookstore staff who are soon to be no longer working in independent bookstores. Listen as the panel speaks about the advent of the “paycheck” — a side benefit of working for another kind of business in the new reality. Featured extra: how to negotiate with your landlord to break your lease with the smallest\u00a0 penalty.
\nGoogle Editions<\/strong> (Room 1E12 Loft)
\nThis educational panel will show you yet another way electronic media and free downloads will cause your store to close in the next ten years. See how the “cloud” is one you’ll float away on after people stop reading actual books.
\nAssociation of Booksellers for Children (ABC) Events:<\/strong>
\nThis year’s Good Ol’ Not-a-Dinner (GONAD) and Silent Auction<\/strong> \u2014 Continuing the tradition of surprising guests with an all-new, improved structure, this event gathers luminaries in the children’s book field: authors and illustrators who speak movingly, announce awards spiritedly, and then elbow one another out of the way to get at the silent auction pieces they’ve been coveting since before that first glass of wine loosed their crazy inner-Jerry-Springer-show-guest clipboard-hogging bid-monster alter egos. Bring checkbook and brass knuckles.
\nABA\/CBC Events:<\/strong>
\nTea with Children’s and YA Authors: <\/strong>This ticketed event includes coffee and dessert at eight-person tables in a room filled with topnotch authors and artists and discussions moderated by fascinating, accomplished booksellers. A pre-session offering tips on table envy will be offered to those ready to fret that their author has won just one, not multiple, Newbery awards.
\nSpeed-Dating with Children’s and YA Authors:<\/strong> This ever-popular, always oversubscribed event is a first-come, first-served morning session you won’t get into, so don’t bother. This is not a ploy to free up some spots for us. Surely not.
\n****
\nThat brings us to an end of our planning guide. What sessions are YOU looking forward to from the perspective of this fine April 1? <\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It’s that time of year again, folks: BEA looms and there are some exciting (and sobering) new educational sessions in 2010; we’ve got the inside scoop. Conference rooms fill quickly, so we thought it might be useful to help children’s booksellers get a jump on this year’s planning. See you in NYC! ***Day of Education […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-735","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/735","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=735"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/735\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=735"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=735"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=735"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}