“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.”
