{"id":18692,"date":"2016-06-09T06:00:23","date_gmt":"2016-06-09T10:00:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/?p=18692"},"modified":"2016-06-09T06:00:23","modified_gmt":"2016-06-09T10:00:23","slug":"why-the-amazon-conversation-needs-to-change","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/?p=18692","title":{"rendered":"Why the (Amazon) Conversation Needs to Change"},"content":{"rendered":"

The nature of our conversation about Amazon needs to change. It needs to become less about individual bookstore transactions and more about facing a common threat to our community’s well being. I knew that. But when a crisis involving my bookstore developed, when the earth began to open under my feet, I understood it with conviction and experience. I\u2019ll share what happened and then offer a thought on two elements involved that I think are worth noting.
\nThe school libraries in the greater Farmington area are among my most important customers. Our town is under considerable financial strain. The school budget necessarily faces significant cuts. The School Library book budget, for example, is slated to be cut in half in all seven schools. There is a robust local group called Support Our Schools, which has a closed online forum with more than 800 members. An active dialogue concerning the library book budget being cut in half developed on the Support Our Schools forum. The idea began to be discussed that, given the shrinking dollars it might be necessary to switch business away from DDG to Amazon and that Amazon Smile might be used as a fundraising source. I had never posted in the group before. The time had come. Here is my post.
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\nAmong the many supportive comments which followed was this side thread.<\/strong>
\nCommunity Member A<\/span>: Thanks for putting this out there Kenny, I will be sure to read it. I was the person who suggested Amazon smiles as a means for cash for amazon purchases outside of books. But Donors choose sounds like a better idea to go with. My ideas were not meant to slight the importance of supporting our local businesses.
\nKenny<\/span>: I appreciate that. Big community problems call upon us, as a community, to make the most of what we have together. As I see it, turning to a community killer would be an unhappy irony.
\nCommunity Member A <\/span>: Thanks for the reminder!
\nA few hours later the side thread continued.<\/strong>
\nCommunity Member A<\/span>: I have to say I’m super embarrassed now that I made the Amazon suggestion. Really. And I read the article you posted here. I’m going to make more of an effort to get back downtown and out of my yoga pants for my shopping. Sorry.
\nKenny<\/span>: That means a lot\u2026 Thank you.
\nIt does mean a lot, on many levels. There was an outpouring of support for the store. Every school librarian in the district wrote to me to say that they were shifting their entire book budget to DDG. Here are the two things I want to note. First, that this dialogue needs to go beyond our bookstores and occur wherever issues of community resources are involved. The idea that a community’s values and best value are achieved by partnering with local businesses rather than turning to a community killer needs to be made. People get it, even if they don\u2019t see it at first. Second, many booksellers wonder whether the outreach efforts they make are worth it or whether their good deeds are perhaps not generating enough business to make sense. I’ve always felt that outreach is both important and valuable. Ask yourself this. When a crisis flash point appears, what wouldn’t you give to have a large amount of community goodwill in the bank?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A crisis shared by the community leads to a better understanding.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-18692","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18692","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=18692"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18692\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=18692"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=18692"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=18692"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}