PNBA Trade Show to Offer a Feast for Booksellers

The Pacific Northwest Booksellers Association (PNBA) Fall Tradeshow Northwest will be held September 10 - 12 at the Oregon Convention Center (OCC) and Red Lion Hotel at OCC in Portland, Oregon. This year's trade show promises a wide array of educational programs for booksellers, publishers, and authors, as well as Book & Author Breakfasts on Saturday and Sunday morning.

Thom Chambliss, executive director for PNBA, told BTW it is good to have the show back at OCC, "our preferred facility. The convention center is one people love." New to the show this year will be PNBA's first annual Feast of Authors, to be held from 7:00 p.m. - 9:00 p.m. on Saturday, September 11. "The Author Feast is modeled after [SCBA's] Moveable Feast," said Chambliss. "It will feature 20 authors, and 20 tables of 10 booksellers each."

Also at the show, ABA will provide educational programming, as well as an exhibit on the trade show floor. This year's exhibit will focus on "Book Sense Gift Cards: One Year Later," featuring live demonstrations. Association staffers will also be on hand seeking member input on new ABA education initiatives, as well as providing general ABA information.

The Book Sense Gift Card Program, just completing its first year of operation, has already helped more than 200 bookstores dramatically increase their sales. The ABA exhibit will give booksellers the opportunity to see firsthand how the gift card program works. As an incentive to try the gift card, ABA will waive the one-time $25 set-up fee for booksellers signing up at the show. (If you plan to sign up at the show, please bring your checking account info with you. For more details on the gift card program, please visit: http://www.bookweb.org/read/6303.)

The number one goal in ABA's strategic plan states: Provide independent professional booksellers with access to the education, information, and business services they need to succeed in a changing world. With this in mind, ABA staffers will be on hand at the show seeking bookseller input on how best to craft ABA's educational offerings moving forward. An "ABA Education 2005 Survey" will be distributed at the show as well as by e-mail and on BookWeb. Watch BTW in the coming weeks for more information about how you can be involved in this process.

On Friday, PNBA has scheduled a full day of panels and workshops. ABA educational programming will include the panel, "Successful Successions: Exit Strategies," held from 10:30 a.m. - 11:45 a.m. Moderated by ABA COO Oren Teicher, this panel features a group of booksellers who have bought or sold stores in recent years sharing their experiences, including Molly Cook, previous owner of Magnolia's Books & Second Story Books in Seattle, Washington. Key issues in valuing a bookstore and assorted strategies on how best to get your store ready to be sold will be discussed. This session will be based, in part, on a series of succession planning seminars offered at BEA by ABA over the past several years.

From 1:15 p.m. - 2:45 p.m., Teicher will moderate "Forming a Local Business Alliance: Finding Success With Independents." This panel will look at how booksellers and other independent businesses nationwide are working together to form local business alliances. These alliances are designed to promote the ever-growing importance of locally owned independent businesses to the economic stability of their communities. Attendees will hear from the Business Alliance for Local Living Economies (BALLE) and the American Independent Business Alliance (AMIBA), as well as from several independent booksellers who have been in the forefront of creating such alliances in their towns and cities, including Chuck Robinson of Village Books in Bellingham, Washington.

Other sessions on Friday include a Bookseller Workshop, where publisher reps will present to attendees their Pick of the Lists; and panels, such as:

• "The Role of the Rep";
  
• "Reeling in Returns: Why, When, & How to Return Inventory Overstock";
  
• "Co-op 101: A Beginner's Guide to Exempt/Newsletter Co-op";
  
• "Co-op 201: Advanced Guide to Exempt/Newsletter Co-op";
  
• "Holiday Catalog Promotional Ideas";
  
• "Selling to the Christian Market"; and
  
• "Buyers Spotlight the Fall Children's List."
  

There will also be a full day of publishing workshops, including workshops on working with printers, creating promo pieces that sell, and niche marketing. Rounding out Friday's sessions will be "A Celebration of Authors," from 3:00 p.m. - 5:00 p.m., where 10 authors will speak, and PNBA's annual "Fall General Membership Meeting." Later that evening, the celebration authors will sign their books at the Red Lion Hotel, from 8:00 p.m. - 10:00 p.m., at the opening night party.

Saturday morning at the Red Lion Hotel, Chitra Divakaruni (Queen of Dreams, Doubleday), A.J. Jacobs (The Know-It-All, Simon & Schuster), and Tony diTerlizzi and Holly Black (The Spiderwick Chronicles, Book 5: The Wrath of Mulgarath, Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers), will speak at the "Book & Author Breakfast." Scott Foley, a former PNBA board member, and a buyer at Grass Roots Books & Music in Corvallis, Oregon, will emcee the event.

The show floor, at OCC, will be open from 9:30 a.m. - 4:30 p.m. on Saturday, with author autographing on the convention floor from 10:00 a.m. - noon and 2:00 p.m. - 3:30 p.m. At 12:30, booksellers are invited to bring a lunch and participate in the "Booksellers Roundtable Lunch" on the exhibit floor and discuss the "One Great Idea That Worked in My Store." A buffet lunch will be available for purchase on the show floor.

In the afternoon, there will be "Book Sense Gift Card Users Group," from 3:00 p.m. - 4:00 p.m., an in-depth review of the gift card program and a discussion about future growth. Booksellers will be asked to share their experiences regarding the operation of the program, as well as their marketing ideas.

Following the gift card session, there will be the "BookSense.com Users Group," held from 4:00 p.m. - 5:00 p.m. Here, attendees will learn about the latest features of BookSense.com, as well as planned enhancements to the product. Non-BookSense.com stores are welcome to attend.

From 7:00 p.m. - 9:00 p.m., in Ballroom 201 of OCC, PNBA's first annual "Feast of Authors" will feature:

• Tom Birdseye (Oh Yeah!, Holiday House);
  
• Harry Bliss (Mrs. Watson Wants Your Teeth, Harcourt);
  
• Phil Condon (Montana Surround, Johnson Books);
  
• Claire Davis (Season of the Snake, St. Martin's);
  
• Lynn Freed (The Curse of the Appropriate Man, Harcourt);
  
• Carol Gardner (Zelda's Survival Guide, Andrews McMeel);
  
• Karsten Heuer (Walking the Big Wild, Mountaineers);
  
• Michael Hoeye (No Time Like Show Time, Penguin);
  
• Ron McLarty (The Memory of Running, Viking);
  
• John Marshall (Home Field, Sasquatch);
  
• Kathleen Dean Moore (Pine Island Paradox, Milkweed);
  
• Nancy Pearl (Book Lust 2005 Calendar, Sasquatch);
  
• Mark Jude Poirier (Modern Ranch Living, Miramax);
  
• Jeff Shaara (To the Last Man, Ballantine);
  
• George Shaffner (In the Land of Second Chances, Algonquin);
  
• Rich Shapero (Wild Animus, Too Far);
  
• Natalia Rachel Singer (Scraping By in the Big Eighties, University of Nebraska Press);
  
• Jasper Tomkins (Catwalk & Camelback Dogs, Sasquatch);
  
• Jess Walter (Citizen Vince, HarperCollins); and
  
• Janet S. Wong (Alex & the Wednesday Chess Club, Simon & Schuster).
  

On Sunday morning, the show will kick off at the Red Lion Hotel with another "Book and Author Breakfast." Pat Rutledge, the president of PNBA and co-owner of A Book for All Seasons in Leavenworth, Washington, will emcee the event, which will feature Christopher Moore (The Stupidest Angel, HarperCollins); Pam Munoz Ryan (Becoming Naomi Leon, Scholastic, Inc.); and Tony Hendra (Father Joe, Random House).

Exhibits will be open from 9:30 a.m. - 2:00 p.m. on Sunday, when the show concludes. Author autographing will take place between 10:00 a.m. and noon.

This schedule is subject to change. For registration and other show information, click on http://www.pnba.org/show.htm or e-mail: [email protected]. --David Grogan