From Publishers Weekly:
Winter Institute, which American Booksellers Association CEO Oren Teicher has called “some of the most significant few days in our calendar,” drew 1,000 attendees to Memphis the week of January 22, including more than 680 booksellers from all 50 states.
. . . .
“For more than five years now, our channel has seen sustained growth—the result of your clear focus on ongoing professional development, tireless work, and continued entrepreneurial innovation,” Teicher told booksellers. He acknowledged that some stores continue to face challenges, particularly as retail dollars continue to shift online. But he assured booksellers, “Our advocacy on your behalf regarding a level playing field will continue as a major priority for 2018.”
. . . .
In addition to working for a playing field on which physical and online stores are treated equally, other bookseller priorities emerged over the course of the conference’s four days—among them the need for diversity in the book business. As Hannah Oliver Depp of Word Books in Brooklyn, N.Y., and Jersey City, N.J., a member of the ABA Task Force on Diversity, noted, “We’ve made a lot of progress, and we have a lot further to go.”
Keynoter Junot Díaz also pushed booksellers to do more for diverse books. In a powerful address, which he titled “In the Time of the Wolf and Fox I Dream of Books” (the “wolf” being conservative whites and the “fox” liberals), he elicited many tears and a standing ovation. Díaz criticized the book industry for being a business in which predominantly white gatekeepers publish predominantly white authors. It’s imperative, he said, for booksellers and librarians, who are on the front lines, to “stop talking about diversity and start decolonizing our shelves.” On behalf of the next generation, he called for “new stories where every single one of us can find ourselves.”
Amazon’s growing dominance in many aspects of our lives, not just books, was also a significant concern. For Kenny Brechner of Devaney, Doak and Garrett in Farmington, Maine, one of the most threatening aspects of that dominance is the erosion of list price. “One thing I hear is, ‘What are you charging for this book?’ ” he said. “We’re in a competing narrative with Amazon. There’s a narrative we need to share. The antitrust laws are just paper, or whatever, without the will to do something about it.”
. . . .
Booksellers should be able to pay their staff a living wage and not have to work long hours or take a second job to do so, she said. “I know publishers that make good profits,” she added. “It would be nice if they could give us an extra percentage.”
Link to the rest at Publishers Weekly
I don’t think they really want diversity – the big publishers. I think they want the same, only different, and only different enough so that it’s not exactly the same.
What the reading public takes into its collective bosom is unknowable – and they hate that.
In addition to working for a playing field on which physical and online stores are treated equally,
Winners compete on the field regardless of the terrain. Losers complain about the field and the competition. Consumers don’t care about level playing fields.
Astounding:
“The antitrust laws are just paper, or whatever, without the will to do something about it.”
The anti-trust law is not there to protect dinosaurs from change.
Level playing field seems to be code for seeking laws to hamstring Amazon.
The appeal to diversity seems to be a hail mary hoping that the diversity activists will adopt them as a cause, despite the fact that Amazon has made it easy for anyone to publish, and self-publishing can be as diverse as authors choosing to write allow.
There’s so much magical thinking here that it astonishes me.
The two big ones:
She wants publishers to GIVE them and extra percentage. Just because. Wow. The world so does not work that way.
She wants a “level playing field” with online and B&M stores treated equally. But they’re not the same thing. They never have been and they never will be.
I think that comes down to volume discounts and terms that depend on number of items sold. If you order a few books to resell – maybe – you just aren’t going to get the same terms as someone who orders a whole skid, or truckload and can sell them without the risk of their being returned.
The level playing field stuff fits in with that obligatory antitrust mention, which was almost incoherent. For people who are surrounded by books and ideas, they can be pretty blockheaded.
“Keynoter Junot Díaz also pushed booksellers to do more for diverse books.”
By whose definition? His? Perhaps booksellers would do better to offer the books people might wish to buy.
“Booksellers should be able to pay their staff a living wage and not have to work long hours or take a second job to do so, she said. “I know publishers that make good profits,” she added. “It would be nice if they could give us an extra percentage.””
So should the writers and editors and cover designers – a living wage for all! 😉
Adapt or die as they say …