I used to work in a large used book store (with a selection of new best-sellers).
I agree that bibliophilia can be both a hindrance and a help. On one hand, customers loved it when I could recommend books or help them find a book that that they couldn’t remember the title or author of. (Sometimes saying “the blue book that was mentioned on Oprah” actually works!) On the other hand, I definitely was always tempted to buy too many books and to read the books on the store’s time. It was sometimes hard to deal with customers who wanted to share their enthusiasm about books that I disliked or disdained:
Customer: Boy, these Left Behind books are the greatest!
Me: Well, they’re very popular. A lot of people like them.
The one thing that really surprised me was how popular religious books were. People would come in and buy tons of them. People would call or email from all over the world (literally) looking for a particular out-of-print title. I just didn’t know people were that interested in religious books.
The best part about working in used books was when someone found something really special to them–like the exact edition of something they had as a kid or a book they’d been searching for for years. That was always fun.
I used to work for Barnes & Noble. In some ways, it was a great job–I was surrounded by books all day, my co-workers were pretty cool. In other ways, not so much–the pay sucked, and I felt bad working for The Man instead of a local, independent bookstore.
One time, I rang up a copy of the Kama Sutra–with photographs–for a pleasant, middle-aged woman. She asked me if we did gift-wrapping. Yes, we do. “Great, it’s for my son’s birthday.” :eek:
Another time, two women came in who were obviously wearing costumes: fake-looking wigs, big sunglasses, etc. They had ordered a particular book. I pulled it for them; they flipped through it; said that it was not the most recent edition, and left. The book was something like “The James Bond Handbook.” It was a collection of photocopied articles about explosives, martial arts, how to recruit your goon squad (open up a karate studio and recruit the students), etc. I’m still intrigued by those two.
lol, yeah, my mother has a store and I used to help out over the Christmas season. Let me tell you, after nine hours of the same cd played over and over, Ella can really just stay in her little jewelcase, at the very back of the cd rack. I do have to listen to it occasionally though since my coworkers like it.
How funny, green bean, I just got a call for the Left Behind series today! Guy telephone. We don’t stock the books, so I told him we didn’t have them new. We did have one copy in used (metaphysics section ), and it turned out to be the first book, so he was in luck. I told him he could order the rest if he wanted to, but we wouldn’t have them in the store unless he did.
I’m also ashamed to say that I’ve read the series…it was truly horribly written. I have a passing interest in religious stuff which is what held my attention, but after the first book (when everyone converted and nobody was cynical anymore) it just got worse and worse.
I’ve a couple questions from the writer’s point of view.
Supposed I’m published, but concerned about getting wide enough distribution. What sort of things impress your store that a book is worth carrying? I guess the question is really what makes a non-best seller attractive.
Do you have authors come in and talk to the public? How is this worthwhile for your store? (Or how worthwhile would it be, if you could do it…)
Any other secrets of “things authors should not do” you’d share?
Our store does not have a lot of say in what we stock. A computer does the majority of our buying for us, which is why our selection is so zany. You’d need to talk to our marketing person (note this is only my store, I can’t speak for others) and maybe we could get a few books on the shelves for you, but it doesn’t happen to often.
My question is… why when I went into Chapters (a place where I can get tons of books and if they don’t have it in they can order it for me…) why oh why were they not able to order in anything from White Wolf?
I went in once when I really really wanted a book… they asked for my name and number and the book name, entered it all in the computer and then said they would call me when they knew if they could order it in then never called me back. About a month afterwards I went to Indigo and walked in, ordered the book. Was told right away they could order it in and then told it would be here in about 4-6 weeks I got it two weeks later!
Do you know of anyway to correlate the sales rank of a book on Amazon to the total sales of that book? For example, say a book on Amazon has a sales rank of 1000. Could you figure out the total number of books sold for that title? Not just on Amazon. Nationwide book sales for that title given that its sales rank on Amazon was 1000? Or is there some other way to find out how many copies of a particular title have been sold?
BTW, for anyone out there who has a book they want to self publish, Amazon has a great program where you can have them carry your book. Check out the Amazon Advantage Program:
I honestly couldn’t tell you, as I think it’s controlled from corporate headquarters. I know our major distributor is Ingram–who I think is THE major distributor, so it’s probably one of their programs.
The OP and the others in this thread have answered most of my questions, but having just put an application in at one of those big bookseller chains (ahem) for a part time job, I do, in fact, have one more that I didn’t see answered:
It’s been 10 days since I turned in my application with no response. I’ve tried twice to call the manager (whose name I got from the lady at the information kiosk in the middle of the store when I asked if she could tell me if there were actually any openings) and he’s been unavailable. Any tips on what I can do to actually get noticed (i.e. hired) without making a pest of myself?
I haven’t worked in the chain bookstores, jadis, so I don’t know their hiring practices. But in my small independent bookstore people turn in their resumes and sometimes they might not get a call back for a long time. It just depends on what we have available. Two months ago if someone turned in a resume, they wouldn’t’ve gotten a call back because we didn’t need anyone right then. So it’s based on need and staff sometimes, rather than the quality of the resume (though when we need someone then that becomes a factor. If we don’t, you could be the founder of the first successful bookstore for all we care).
Elshatan, do you work for Barnes & Noble? It sounds like you do; that’s where I work here in Baltimore. I understand if you don’t want to broadcast that, though, it’s all good.
The best part about my job is that I absolutely adore reading (it’s definitely not my pay). I took a pay cut to get this job, because I wanted so badly to work in a bookstore, and it’s been worth it. My managers and co-workers still suck; it’s still a crappy retail job, and customers still get on my nerves on a regular basis, but it’s hard to be negative when I am surrounded by my most favorite thing in the world. Also, since I’m an English major and have been reading like a maniac since I was 8, I walked into the job with a huge basis of knowledge, and that makes it fairly easy for me to help my customers. If you don’t know the author, I probably do.
Money’s fairly tight for me, so I don’t buy more books than usual, but I do have an awesome discount, and I can borrow hardcover books for two weeks at a time. I do that so much (my borrow log has a longer list than anyone else, and I’ve only been there for four months!), and I love talking about books so much, that I now have a regular group of customers (mostly women) who specifically ask for me and want to know what books I’ve read and liked recently. It’s definitely the best part of my job, because these customers really respect my opinion and buy what I recommend.
The three books I’ve loved most recently (not that anyone asked, but…) are The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold, The Education of Mrs. Bemis by John Sedgwick, and The Frog King by Adam Davies. All three have engrossing plots, amazing characterization, and worthwhile endings.
You liked the Frog King? There’s a reader’s copy at work that I’ve looked at a couple times, but what with the stacks on my shelves, I wasn’t sure it was worth it. I just started How to Cook a Tart and so far it’s pretty good. Not as hilarious as I’ve been told, but pretty good.
First, realize the only way you (or anyone) is even going to get called is sheer dumb luck, previous retail experience, or knowing someone already employed there. I’d like to say something about how each application is impressively read and critiqued, but we get fistfuls of the applications every day, open position or not, and in my experience, it’s one of those three that gets you hired. If you’re wondering, sheer dumb luck and knowing someone already employed there got me in the door.
What you can do to get noticed:
Have the same availability as they have an opening for
Have some experience
Fill out the application correctly (those that aren’t are instantly tossed out)
Do NOT, repeat, Do NOT put “personal reasons”, “personality conflicts,” “management issues”, or anything that implies you are anything but the consummate team player as a reason for leaving. Managers like to think everyone lives in complete and utter happiness. The suits, as they say, stick together.
Once you’ve turned it in, the only thing you can do is wait. The HR manager at my store assures me that every application gets looked over. Those who meet our current requirements may get a call. Those who don’t may not get anything.
I’d rather not say, cause trashing my employer on a public forum with a good-sized readership isn’t the wisest idea.
Personally speaking, I love the majority of our customers. We get the idiots, of course (the guy who was going to get me fired for not letting him in the store five minutes early is my favorite), but I enjoy helping people. In my free time, I’ve got liberal borrowing privleges, so I can explore new interests like computer programming and game design. I like helping people and I don’t take the idiots personally.
What I don’t like is our current management team. Our general manager doesn’t seem to realize that the ultimate point of a business is to make money, even if it’s just enough to cover expenses. Our inventory system is FUBAR–it’s easily fixed, but she doesn’t want to force other managers to work. Anyone who does exceptional work gets rewarded by being handed more piles of work, usually belonging to someone who doesn’t do their job in the first place. Quite a few of our managers have no life outside the bookstore, so they can’t understand things like “needing some time off” and “being with family”. One manager, in the words of Wally from Dilbert, just walks around with a clipboard and makes people loathe him. Most of our good employees have changed stores or positions (me included, I’m going back to school, so only working part-time) or have decided the best recourse is to do just enough work to not draw attention to themselves.
The shame of it is the majority of our staff is really good, and they really like what they do. Most of my coworkers are competent, if not exceptionally good at their jobs, and with some decent management, the store could be doing really well. One example I can think of is our Corporate Sales rep (he, basically, takes those calls from companies that want 100 copies of Who Moved My Cheese? by Friday). If they’d leave him alone, he’d be out hustling 24/7, he’s just amazing at his job. But they keep changing schedule around, hiding all his “Sign Up For Coporate Discounts!” signs, and so on. And so we lose money.
), and it turned out to be the first book, so he was in luck. I told him he could order the rest if he wanted to, but we wouldn’t have them in the store unless he did.