Book Fairs
= Big Biz?
FROM PUBLISHING
TRENDS (JUNE 2003)
“It’s
the damndest thing — all these people show up,” a genial
George Plimpton told reporters at the recent
LA Times Festival of Books. “And we’d
thought people in LA don’t read books.” Indeed, as 150,000
visitors (plus 350 authors and even some East Coast
publishers) swarmed the UCLA campus over two days in
April — attendance was considerably up from 90,000 three
years ago — many in the publishing industry were sharply
reminded that book fairs are becoming big business.
In
the past two years, we’ve seen the advent of the annual
National Book Festival (October, in DC), co-hosted
by the Library of Congress and Laura Bush;
the flourishing of the Chicago Book Festival,
which began in 2000 as Book Week and has now become
a monthlong October celebration under the auspices of
the Chicago Public Library, with support from
Mayor Daley; and the launch of the annual New
Yorker Festival — not strictly for books but
tied to authors and readers — which last year moved
from May to the same weekend in September as the venerable
New York Is Book Country. (Though the two festivals
have no ties — NYIBC has a longtime sponsor in The
New York Times — this year they will not only take
place the same weekend but will have events down the
street from one another, with NYIBC extending down to
42nd Street and the New Yorker holding court
at the New York Public Library.)
Not only are book fairs multiplying, but they’re also
making impressive displays of bookselling brawn. “Massive”
book sales were made at the LA Times festival,
according to Times Senior Project Manager Glenn
Geffcken, who reports that over 100 publishers staked
out booths this year (next year’s date is April 24-25,
2004). While booksellers flock to the festival, publisher
booths have become major draws among the more than 300
total exhibitors. “Ironically, we have a higher percentage
of small presses exhibiting than actual booksellers,”
Geffcken says, noting that small bookshops often can’t
spare the staff to make the trek to UCLA — even as some
report racking up as much business at the two-day fest
as in the month of December.
According
to an exit survey at last year’s festival, 81% of attendees
said they came to browse the publisher and bookseller
booths, and so rabid was the book buying this year that
patrons refused to put their wallets away when the festival
drew to a close. Geffcken says: “We had to go around
with a bullhorn telling people very kindly, ‘We’re sorry,
but the festival’s over now.’”
Bookselling has always been a priority at the massive
Miami Book Fair International, co-founded by
Books & Books’ Mitch Kaplan, who says
that the fair will celebrate its 20th anniversary this
year (November 2-9, 2003) with more than 300 exhibitors
and projections of 500,000 visitors. Also celebrating
a big anniversary (its 25th) is New York Is Book Country,
whose street fair on Fifth Avenue (September 17-21,
2003) boasts an increasing emphasis on promoting book
sales. Last year, the first year the festival attempted
to track sales, an estimated 20,000 volumes were sold
at the fair and the tie-in brunch and tea. More sales
opportunities abound this year at the fair itself, as
well as at several themed events in September and October,
including one focused on business books and several
celebrating cookbooks (New York Is Cookbook Country
runs October 15-19, 2003). Included in the ticket prices
is an automatic discount on participants’ books, which
will be sold on site.
“Book
lovers are book buyers, and book buyers attend book
fairs,” reasons Executive Director Courtney Muller.
“If today’s consumer book fairs don’t put a focus on
bookselling, and encourage it at every turn, it’s a
huge missed opportunity.”
©2003
Publishing Trends
