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Oh whoop, it’s Threadapalooza day! I almost forgot. Decided to take this prompt from Nick. Here goes: 1 like, 1 SECRET OF THE BOOKSTORE
what are some things about running a book store that might surprise us (me)
— Nick (@nickcammarata) April 8, 2021
1/ This may not seem like a secret, but Amazon is the biggest bookseller in the world. Not just new books: something like 95% of used book traffic happens on Amazon marketplace. (All numbers in this thread are either misremembered or made up, do not seek citations.)
2/ Amazon doesn’t even make money from the books they sell. They sell their new titles at or below cost much of the time. So as nice as it is that many people come in the bookstore and say “I didn’t want to buy from the evil empire”, it’s not hurting Amazon at all.
3/ Amazon got its start with books, but now they make their money from selling “computer power”. Do you know why Mr. Jeff started with books though? Well, they’re square. Good for packaging. They each have a unique label. Good for inventory. And they’re cheap to ship, by Media Mail.
4/ Unpopular opinion but I really should be doing some shelving right now. Shelving is really important as it keeps the books easily accessed. If a person can’t grab the book with a single finger they often just won’t read it. Each shelf should have one book worth of empty space.
6/ Well technically, since I don’t want to take books from the to-be-shelved cart and find where they go, or re-alphabetize misplaced books, I won’t be doing shelving. Instead I’ll just make each shelf have a correct looseness and straighten and dust them. We call this “fluffing”.
7/ Obviously it is desirable for me to chug coffee in the break room and write tweets about bookselling. They will be a valuable source of information to future versions of myself or others who may be running a bookstore. But first, the shelving. Be back soon.
8/ Great question. In fact our local library sale bans electronics! But the thrift stores have had the best stuff picked out. I’ve seen teams, including a Mennonite woman with children, and a middle-aged guy who brings books to his handicapped mom to scan.
how have mindless book scanners affected your business? they ruined all the library sales around us.
— Puzzleman 🧩 (@Neil_Jetter) December 15, 2021
9/ Personally I don’t care if book scanners want to take the used books that have already been picked over by the library or thrift store. They’re not selling them cheap enough for the slow velocity with which they will sell. Used books are a competitive market with low profits.
10/ Mr. Jeff also knew that most books only sell once a year, and it’s a lot cheaper to keep those books in a warehouse than on a shop floor with location location location.
I thought one of the big factors was he decided the long tail model of bookselling was particularly conducive to online store.
— differently scrupled (@diff_scrupled) December 15, 2021
11/ Books are bulky, heavy, non-fungible, and often emotionally charged. People have trouble getting rid of books. They will literally give you their books for free. Although the better the book, the more likely they want to get something for it.
12/ I talked to a used bookseller in Pittsburgh who said he had dropped his prices to a dime in cash or a quarter in store credit and people didn’t bat an eye. I still give $1-3 in credit, which feels like a bad deal for me half the time but a bad deal for you the other half. 🤷🏼
13/ Used or new, selling books in a brick and mortar store is all about your shelf space. Shelves are finite, no matter how big and cheap your space. Shelves are your bottleneck. Oh wait, I’m supposed to be shelving.
14/ One strategy is to maximize individual book value. This is your rare and used book seller, where each book might cost between 50 and a million bucks. So it’s okay if they sit on the shelf for a long time before selling.
15/ The other way is to maximize turnover. Stock the best selling books and sell each one multiple times in a year. This is the strategy that new bookstores take, of course. It’s easier when you can get more copies on demand.
16/ The traditional used bookstore model tries to maximize individual book margin by paying little to nothing per book, and selling the books cheap enough that they still move out the door. But this leaves the worst books on the shelf. You can’t restock the ones that sell.
17/ We now use a hybrid model, where we stock used and new next to each other. This model was pioneered by Powell’s. It allows for a good combination of serendipity and reliable inventory. We have to be pickier about used books now though, if they’re to compare to new copies.
18/ I only wish we had this capacity to supply people this way. Powell’s has dozens of rooms over four floors. Our little storefront is the size of maybe one room. We can shelve about 10,000. My mission is to make sure they’re the right ones.
Love that. Powell's is one of the coolest stores I've been to; walked out with like 9 books in 30 minutes that I was super excited about. Hybrid ftw
— εƭɦαɳ (@neuro_stack) December 15, 2021
19/ My relationship to books is now like my relationship to cryptocurrencies. I judge each book by if it has a cool name or cover art, then keep trying to buy and sell it until it stops making me money.
How does a typical day look?
— Chris (1/43) (@chrislorck) December 16, 2021
How did your relationship to books change?
Books which to your surprise were sold a lot?
20/ Really, I don’t read that many books anymore. I find it hard to finish them. I start a lot of books though. I am addicted to Twitter so 🥲 maybe that’s why I just shuffle books through my hands all day.
Oh jeez only 43 more to go, hope people stop clicking on this haha.
21/ As far as I can tell, people use book scanners to tell them which books will sell on Amazon. Not for a whole lot, necessarily. I believe they aim for high-velocity books, which means looking for books with a high Amazon sales rank. Shelf limit again.
what exactly do book scanners do? are they scanning to find the books that’ll resell for a lot?
— Jessica (@manipulanda) December 16, 2021
22/ Online sales are only a small fraction of my business, but probably the majority of book selling businesses out there are online-only. They’ll have a garage, or a storage unit, or a warehouse, and list their inventory with online markets. Storefronts are expensive.
23/ The way brick-and-mortar bookstores afford their storefront space is by providing something other than the literal books. If you can get a used book for $4 from a scanner with a garage, or a new one for 60% of the cover price from Amazon, why would you pay more for mine?
24/ Part of what we provide is a sense of moral good. Spend your money here to support local, and defeat the Evil Amazonian Empire! And that’s sweet: people are paying more to feel good about themselves and their community. But as a Rebel Alliance we lack strategy and resources.
25/ So we’re not going to actually defeat Amazon. They’re the Everything Store now, plus they have “Computer Power”. They could stop selling books right now and not notice. But they won’t, because… everything store. Bookstores have to be valuable as an end in themselves.
26/ So bookstores need to have the books people want, but they also need something else. A coffee shop, or bar maybe. Event space and a constant slate of events. A political angle, perhaps (though these seem to chronically underestimate the value of selling the books people want).
27/ My place sells local authors. We’re also a family store with a cute backstory. We held a ton of events (before COVID) for local authors and poets, building goodwill in that community. I’m not sure that the local books will ever turn a profit. But those authors buy books. 🤑
28/ This is a great point. Bookstores are a public space where you can meet other book people. We considered Book People as a name for the store in fact, because it’s that important to the vibe. But it’s already a well-established store in Austin.
bookstores provide a public space. people don't go on amazon dates (i pray)
— Jag Flagstags (@money_illusion) December 16, 2021
29/ Bookstores are romantic. I see a lot of dates. (They don’t buy much.) I actually met my gf in the bookstore. She walked in and I neurotically reshelved books until she talked to me. Then she stumbled on her words and we introduced ourselves and shook hands. Then she left.
30/ We’ve got an ACTIVE BOOKSTORE DATE scenario RIGHT NOW folks!!!!1!! Send good vibes ASAP. https://x.com/nair_oos/status/1471307043218677760?s=20
31/ A bookstore is a communal hallucination paid for by the goodwill and effort of the booksellers and bookbuyers alike. Your local bookstore is basically Tinkerbell: if people stop believing in it, it will vanish (please clap).
32/ Now that I think about it, she didn’t buy any books that day, then quickly started receiving books as gifts, and now I just get her any book she asks for. Has my gf ever bought a book? 🤔
29/ Bookstores are romantic. I see a lot of dates. (They don't buy much)
— web weaver (@deepfates) December 16, 2021
I actually met my gf in the bookstore. She walked in and I neurotically reshelved books until she talked to me. Then she stumbled on her words and we introduced ourselves and shook hands. thne she left
33/ My gf is one of those people who actively destroys a book by reading it. She folds the front cover around to the back. She sets it face down wide open. She’ll use any object as a bookmark: pencil, hair tie, spoon, a whole other book. She’s wonderful, but we are different.
34/ I don’t mind this anymore, actually. Growing up I treated books as sacred (except the ones I left in my car with the windows down in the rain). But now I look at a book-destroyer and think: good. Keep supply down.
35/ I do like to keep my books in good condition, though. Especially now that I can actually sell them. Pretty much any book I read I take back to the store, except the ones that are super special to me.
36/ So my house has a mixture of super-treasured rare valuable books, random paperbacks that gf devoured, and dozens of strays that I rescued from the trash. Things like “100 Important Knots” or “A Friendly Introduction to Math” that were too beat up to sell but too cute to die.
37/ I am actually a bad person to answer this question, I think. I had never been a bookstore clerk before opening a bookstore. I suppose general clerking experience will help. And then you’ll want some book knowledge ;) Maybe a specialty, a genre.
how to become bookstore clerk?
— fox (@aemiliusprobus) December 16, 2021
38/ Really, the best way is to go to the bookstore a lot and be friendly with whoever works there. I doubt a bookstore has to put up an ad on Craigslist; the people who hang around are already trusted and familiar with the space and its rules. Bookstores are made of people.
39/ This is genius. Your load gets lighter the more you read. One time me and gf were gonna hike a mountain and sleep at the top. We were near the end of this hardback (we read out loud) didn’t want to bring the weight. So she cut out the last 20 pages.
My dad used to tell me about how he and his brother read on climbing trips.
— Conrad Mearns (@conrad_mearns) December 16, 2021
Big bro would read a page, rip it out, hand it to my dad. Dad would read it, then feed the page to the fire.
40/ Maybe the best way to become a bookstore clerk is to start a bookstore. You just need to have a business bank account and you can start ordering books wholesale. I know someone who has a couple shelves in one of these “retail collective” spaces. Pretty cheap rent I think.