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NCIBA Newsletter
JULY 2014
In This Issue
Authors Galore at Fall Discovery Show
"New" Logo for California Bookstore Day
Tech Tip of the Month
East Bay's Best Bookstores
'Hut's Place' Keeps Selling Books
Book Publishing Party on July 31!
Sales Rep Update
Join Publisher Promotion Program

NCIBA 2014 Fall Discovery Show

October 23-24

South San Francisco Conference Center


Exhibitor Registration Kit Now Ready


Our Author Reception Will Feature 30
Writers and Illustrators Signing Books & Galleys and Talking to Booksellers.

Here Are Just A Few To Look Forward To:

Wendy McNaughton

Elizabeth Rosner

Christian Kiefer

Sabaa Tahir

Alice Medrich


Jory John

Jennifer Lynn Alvarez

Julia Scott
October 23-24, South San Francisco
Authors Galore at NCIBA Fall Discovery Show
 
The NCIBA office and board of directors has been busy lining up author appearances for our Discovery Show, and we're pleased to offer up a preview of the speakers for our three meal events. Authors are listed alphabetically, not in order of preference - we love 'em all! 
 

BUZZ LUNCH (authors with new books in early 2015)   

Joshua Davis, Spare Parts, FSG

Jan Ellison, A Small Indiscretion, Random House

Geronimo T. Johnson, Welcome to Braggsville, Harper

Alaine Ohanesian, Orhan's Inheritance, Algonquin

Stewart O'Nan, West of Sunset, Viking

Ann Packer, The Children's Crusade, Scribner

Priya Parmar, Vanessa and Her Sister, Ballantine

 

CHILDREN'S TEA 

Kazu Kibuishi, Amulet #6: Escape from Lucien, Scholastic

and Raina Telgemeier, Sisters, Scholastic

Jandy Nelson, I'll Give You the Sun, Dial

Frank Portman, King Dork Approximately, Delacorte

Scott Westerfeld, Afterworlds, S&S

  

AUTHOR BRUNCH

T. Jefferson Parker, Full Measure, St. Martin's

Rebecca Solnit, The Encyclopedia of Trouble and Spaciousness, Trinity University Press  

Garth Stein, A Sudden Light, Simon & Schuster

Sarah Thornton, 33 Artists in 3 Acts, Norton

 

We'll also be kicking off the show this year with Keynote speaker (and local hero) Daniel Handler, discussing his forthcoming novel We Are Pirates (Bloomsbury). One of the early readers of the book, Neil Gaiman, has this to say about it:
"Honest and funny, dark and painful, We Are Pirates
reads like the result of a nightmarish mating experiment between Joseph Heller and Captain Jack Sparrow. It's the strangest, most brilliant offering yet from the mind behind Lemony Snicket."  

 "New" Logo for California Bookstore Day 2015
Everyone's favorite bear is back for year two of California Bookstore Day, and we're delighted to welcome her as CBD 2015 begins its work in earnest. Let us know if you'd like a copy for your website!

P.S. There's also a horizontal version on the CBD site
that's good for an email signature.


Tech Tip of the Month
In response to a question about what SnapWidget was and how it could be used by bookstores, Nici McCown from Bookshop Santa Cruz submitted the following:

We used SnapWidget to put a page on our website about our Instagram feed:
It was so easy that when first asked, I totally forgot about it. I just set it up, made it live, and erased that part of my memory.

The free version provided the features we needed. Just fill out the customized form (http://snapwidget.com/#getstarted) and it generates the code for you. For stores using the ABA's IndieCommerce platform, you can add this in to any page you create by editing the page, disabling rich text editing, and pasting in the code. As with all IndieCommerce platform pages, making sure "Input format" is set to " Rich Text Editing."

The most basic way to use this would be to - as we do - display your stores Instagram feed. You could also display a hashtag that you encourage customers to use.
The cool thing about displaying hashtags is that you can really encourage customer and community participation. The drawback of displaying hashtags is that anyone can post photos to them. Instagram is pretty good (possibly too draconian) about not letting people post nakedness, etc. But they won't prevent someone from, say, posting a screenshot from Amazon to a hashtag you are displaying on your site. So our store has never used it that way.

Check out this demo page of the different styles: The paid version ($6.99/month) has features I would like: you can use Google Analytics, you can link right to Instagram (free version links to SnapWidget which links to Instagram), and you can filter by both hashtag and user name which would open up a lot of possibilities - but we're sticking to the free for now.

Do you have a tech question? Send it to office@nciba.com and we'll try to get it answered in an upcoming newsletter.

Three of the East Bay's "Best" Bookstores
OAKLAND Magazine
2014 Best Of Oakland and the East Bay
Editors' Choice
BEST COMMUNITY-BUILDING BOOKSTORE
A Great Good Place for Books

East Bay Express
2014 Best of the East Bay
Best Bookstore
Pegasus Books

DIABLO Magazine
2014 Best of the East Bay
Reader Pick: Indie Bookstore
Rakestraw Books

'Hut's Place' Keeps Selling Books
The goal of the weekly Hut's Place column is to alert book lovers to new arrivals (both hardcover and paperback) and bestselling books in independent bookstores and motivate them to buy more. Recent feedback seems to indicate it's working:

Please add me to your mailing list for Hut's Place; your newsletter fills a real need. Ever since the Washington Post discontinued its Book World, I've been missing regular reading recommendations. And Hut's Place looks lively, interesting and the brevity is helpful as well.

Your column has helped me discover books that I have subsequently purchased at my local independent bookstore.  Some books I've given as gifts and some are for myself.  I just picked up The Rosie Project today.  I've shared the column with many people and will send along to some others.  You are providing a great service to book lovers.

 I love your column.  It sends me scrambling down to my local independent book store, Book Passage, to buy yet more books.  It also has me passing your recommendations to my several book groups.  Thank you.

Hut's Place is a hit with me.  I love the format and I trust your recommendations and always buy Indie if I can.

"Since joining the mailing list for Hut's Place, I've purchased a number of great books based on Hut's recommendations; in fact I go to the site every time I need a new book."

"Just wanted to send a shout out to Hut for giving me good ideas every week in my quest for good books...now that, as a former librarian, I no longer have the luxury of being in the know when it comes to books."

To read the latest edition of Hut's Place, click here. If you want to forward to customers and encourage them to subscribe, make sure to remind them that the books they read about are available at your store.

Invitation to Local Book and Publishing Community

July 31: A Night of Books, Booze, and Schmooze
5:30 - 8:30 pm  
111 Minna Street, San Francisco
 
Special Guest Speakers from Publishers Weekly:
Cevin Bryerman, Publisher
Jim Milliot, Editor-in-Chief

Produced by:
Book Promotion Forum (formerly NCBPMA)
Books & Booze
Publishers Weekly

Co-Sponsored by: NCIBA

Space is limited, so RSVP for free now via Eventbrite to guarantee your admittance!

$10 admission includes one drink ticket - attendees will be asked to pay cash at the door.

111 Minna is strictly a 21+ event.

Other Event Highlights:
Meet the 2014 Butterfield Scholarship winner!
BPF and Books and Booze will have a special announcement to make, if you work in (any) area of publishing we think you will want to hear our news.

SHARE this with your publishing friends, while you're at it!

P.S .- BPF and Books and Booze will have a special announcement to make, if you work in (any) area of publishing we think you will want to hear our news.

Sales Rep Update
Nancy Suib & Associates is now the representative for Gryphon House.

Nancy Suib & Associates
510 482-2303
fax 510 482-8573
nancy.suib@gmail.com

Join the Publisher Promotion Offer Program   
The New Atlantic Independent Booksellers Association (NAIBA) and NCIBA are inviting bookstores from all regions of the country to take advantage of a new program that aims to make booksellers' weekly ordering more efficient and profitable. Booksellers who sign up for the NAIBA Promotion Offer Program through NCIBA (just send a note to hut@nciba.com) will receive an Excel document via e-mail every Monday morning listing current publisher promotions. The e-mail will feature upcoming and ongoing promotions that affect ordering and potential sales.

Publishers can submit their promotions on Wednesdays via a Google Docs form.

"This is another example of how a common problem faced by booksellers was solved simply because a bookseller was at a meeting and mentioned their wish for some industry efficiencies," said NAIBA Executive Director Eileen Dengler. "NAIBA did it last year with the Publishers Advocate program (where booksellers receive marked-up Edelweiss catalogs) and now the Publishers Offer Program. It demonstrates the value of our trade associations and what we do to help our members."