Inside the Mind of a Bookseller
Mar
'07
Today I spent the entire day comping (putting in order alphabetically and by subject) the Reference section at the bookstore. I’d started this project last Monday, moving shelves so that they matched across the entire row and then comping the Wedding section. Yesterday I finished from Etiquette through Sign Language, and today I got through Foreign Languages and Dictionaries.
We have a “Libros en Espaniol” section. It was awful. It was like doing an entire section’s worth of shipment and having to put it all in the correct place without any books on the shelf to guide me. To be honest, I liked it, and I felt accomplished afterward; however, the Spanish-speaking population of our customers avoided the section (politely) while I was working on it, but as soon as I finished, they attacked it like ravenous crows waiting for slim pickin’s. I understand. That section is never in order, and finally they could browse their language in peace without having to figure out why Phil McGraw is shelved next to Isabel Allende, and why either of these books are included in the Children’s subcategory. I could see the excitment across one woman’s face (a regular) as she dove for The Alchemist, previously lost behind the one Spanish-language art book about Africa. It’s those smiles of appreciation that keep me going.
By the end of the day (which was only an hour ago), I wager, that section is out of order; perhaps (and hopefully) not as bad as it was, but I wonder sometimes if we comp in vain. Liana, our kids specialist, puts a lot of work into the kid’s section - keeping it in order, bringing in new ideas about where sections should go (based on shelfspace and customer convenience), etc - but every time we work together, there’s always that “why do I do this?” conversation.
Why do we do this? I’ll tell you. It makes it easier for us to find books. The average customer walks in and sees a shelf full of books. They don’t see a shelf that’s alphabetically in order, they don’t see the prettiness of a recently comped section with straightened books and even numbers of face-outs. They just see a whole bunch of books. Browsers find the books they want based on covers (and in this way, face-outs are necessary) and those looking for specific books usually end up leaving unhappy or asking for help. Why? Because despite the fact that, yes, VC Andrews is shelved right next to Mary Kay Andrews, as it should be, this customer only sees VC Andrews books because Oh My God there are a lot of them. Despite the brightness of Mary Kay Andrews’ covers and the way they stand out in a sea of VC Andrews (most of our VC Andrews books are mass markets, whereas Mary Kay Andrews are hardcovers and trade paperbacks), this customer is not going to see Savannah Blues because she is lazy and doesn’t want to try that hard.
And yet, they tell us we’re comping sections because it makes it easier for customers to find books. I still get the question, “Are these in order by author or title?” I can’t wait for the day when someone comes in and asks if the books are ordered by size.
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