Voices on Writing: Robert Gray, Handseller of Books

By Barbara DeMarco-Barrett

Robert Gray brings books to the attention of booksellers. His company, Fresh Eyes Now LLC, offers a frontline bookseller's perspective to publishers and authors who want to increase their readership. From 1992 to 2005, he worked as a bookseller and buyer for the Northshire Bookstore in Manchester, VT and was named the store's first Master Bookseller in 2000. His writing has appeared in Publishers Weekly, Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine, Tin House and Cimarron Review. He is a contributing Reviewer to Eclectica Magazine. He earned an MFA in Writing & Literature from Bennington College in 2003. He is also the author of Fresh Eyes: A Bookseller's Journal, a publishing industry blog at Publishers Marketplace.

BDB: For 13 years, you were a bookseller at the Northshire Bookstore in Manchester, VT. What did you learn about the book trade by selling to readers?

RG: "Everything" is the short answer. Working with readers every day, I discovered almost from the beginning that selling books wasn't just about merchandising strategies and sales pitches; it was about conversations and listening. The book trade spends a lot of time and money talking at bookstore customers, but not nearly enough time listening to them. At least half the time I spent hand selling books to customers was given over to hearing what they had to say about their reading life. I couldn't recommend a book confidently until I knew something about them. I learned from my readers that bookselling at every level thrives with the personal touch.

BDB: Did this experience make you more or less hopeful about the publishing industry?

RG: I'd call myself a realist. There are motivated, intelligent and talented people working at every level of the industry, in companies large and small. They are often handicapped by the system, but they do the best they can. I'm optimistic about the effect one person can have on the fate of a book, though more fatalistic about the machine as a whole. It takes at least six or seven passionate "handsells" (author to agent, agent to editor, etc.) to give a book any chance to survive, much less thrive, in this insanely competitive marketplace. The successful book (and success has many meanings) makes it through the publishing labyrinth not only because that chain of handsells works, but also because a couple of those people give extra effort to help it along. This doesn't happen for most books, but when it does, it's a beautiful thing to see.

BDB: You've said that you learned a ton about selling books from your years in the retail grocery industry. I'd say this is unusual.

RG: I would go back to my first answer, about "conversations." Few people go into a grocery store because they want the supermarket experience. They go because they need supplies, and a supermarket offers everything in one place at a reasonable price. They go because they have to. No one goes into a bookstore because they have to. There are too many alternative sites, real and virtual, to buy a book (including, ironically, supermarkets). Therefore, if someone opens the door to your bookstore, they are making a choice. They've come for a visit, you might say, and if you're not willing to play gracious host, then they probably won't be back. Bad customer interactions were extremely rare during my 13 years as a bookseller, while they were a daily experience in the supermarket because we had a captive, irritated audience. Again, I learned that I wasn't selling my customers books like tuna fish. I was inviting them into my library and letting them borrow a book (though of course they had to pay the late fee up front in this library). Supermarkets are bazaars; bookstores are theaters.

BDB: So now you are a "bookseller to other handsellers."

RG: As a frontline bookseller for so many years, I witnessed the daily flood of galleys and comp copies sent to our bookstore. Most (and I'm talking dozens daily sometimes) came to the attention of the frontlist buyer or marketing director, and most ended up in heaps on their desks or in the staff kitchen on floor-to-ceiling bookcases. If a publisher was very lucky, a frontline bookseller might pluck their title from those shelves, but the majority of galleys entering any bookstore go through unread. On the other hand, when a publisher or sales rep had a sense of who the good handsellers were in our store, galleys would be sent directly to these folks. That extra effort paid an immediate dividend because frontline booksellers simply don't receive as many galleys as buyers and marketing depts. The odds of frontline booksellers reading a galley sent directly to them are much better. In addition, if a frontline bookseller loves your book, he or she is in a position to handsell directly to customers, which is generally not true of buyers and marketing people. With Fresh Eyes Now, I'm working with authors and publishers to help them place their galleys and comp copies in the hands of people who will actually read the works and can do the most good if they like what they read.

BDB: So authors come to you and you connect them with bookstores?

RG: Not just bookstores, but handsellers whose reading tastes are compatible with a particular title. It's easy to find bookstores; it takes more work to find handsellers, but they're out there. Handselling is the primary reason great frontline booksellers stay in a job that is low-paying and underappreciated by the industry as a whole. Handselling is its own reward. I know. I'm a handseller myself.

BDB: Authors hear conflicting things when it comes to promoting their books. Do signings at bookstores; don't do signings at bookstores. Hire an independent publicist; don't hire an independent publicist. What works?

RG: Lots of variables here. Those strategies all work for some authors and don't work for others. My best advice is to know yourself and go with your strengths. The one-size-fits-all approach doesn't work. If you hate speaking in public and don't want to work at it, you're crazy to schedule a huge bookstore tour because you're not going to be able to handsell your own book. Look at your book, try to imagine who your audience is and opt for the strategies that seem most likely to reach the people you need to reach. If you have a literary novel, finding passionate handsellers can be a great advantage. If you have a nonfiction book on yoga, you can perhaps do better concentrating on non-bookstore venues. The answer to "What works?" is nothing and/or everything, depending on the individual author's situation.

BDB: What if an author has little money to put toward publicity?

RG: Then they will have to invest time, and lots of it, trying to make connections all over the country with bookstores, reading groups, local organizations if appropriate, etc. I don't think there is a mass strategy (postcards, brochures, etc.) that reliably works. You have to do this, if I may steal from Anne Lamott, "bird by bird."

BDB: What do authors miss when it comes to what to expect regarding their newly-released book?

RG: Far too many authors believe that their work is done when they turn in the manuscript. It's only beginning.

BDB: What are some things we may miss, when it comes to getting booksellers to pay attention to our books?

RG: Treat them with respect, as fellow readers. Check out staff picks online or in a bookshop, and seek out kindred souls. Don't pick out a bookseller at random and make your pitch. Have a conversation about books you both like. I've been approached by hundreds of authors over the years, and like most frontline booksellers, I have certain defensive shields that go up when an author introduces him or herself to me. I can anticipate the pitch. I need to be surprised to be reached. Surprise me. Surprise any bookseller. Remember that the handsellers you want to reach are not just store clerks, though they are often hidden among store clerks in a bookshop of any size. These handsellers may be as well or better educated than you are; they may be better read; they may have chosen to be a bookseller because they liked the lifestyle and were willing to make financial sacrifices to get it. Above all, they are talented readers. Respect their craft, and they may respect yours.

BDB: So if you go out to a bookstore to introduce yourself, to whom do you introduce yourself-the manager on duty? Book buyer?

RG: You should develop your relationships with local and regional booksellers long before you need them. Make working with you irresistible and inevitable. Whom you need to meet will depend upon the bookstore, but the more you know about your local bookstores, the better idea you will have of the people who are handselling books like yours.

BDB: I'm curious: Large bookstores, like Borders, like B&N, seem like they have clerks that, for the most part, are indifferent about the books in the store-unlike an independent bookstore. How does an author foster a relationship with a store that large?

RG: The challenge in fostering a relationship with a chain store is that so many decisions are made at corporate level. When I was working in an indie bookstore, if I wanted to bring in multiple copies of a book (for display and handselling) that the frontlist buyer hadn't originally ordered, I simply keyed the order in and took responsibility for the buy. I'm not sure chain frontline booksellers have that kind of leverage. The chain buyers make substantial buying commitments to certain titles, and it's not in their best interest to have that display space taken up by maverick choices of individual booksellers. That said, there are handsellers working the sales floors in chain stores and it doesn't hurt to try and make some new friends within an author's region.

BDB: Also, should an author continue to promote a book after it's been out a year-two years? I guess what I'm saying is, can you-and should you-give your book "legs"?

RG: I'm a firm believer that if a reader hasn't heard about your book yet, it's still a frontlist title to them. As a frontline bookseller, I was still handselling five-10-15 copies a month of titles that had been out for a decade, because they seemed a good fit with the customers I was talking to at any given moment. In addition, "legs" are also important if your publisher is sitting on a few thousand copies of your book six months into its shelf life. Sending out 50 or 100 comp copies to targeted handsellers at that point might provide just the jump start it needed for another chance at life.

BDB: What's the most gratifying part of your job?

RG: I'll answer for both my old job and my new one, since I'm a bookseller in both. When I was in the store, the most gratifying part was when a customer came in to talk to me about the book I had recommended the last time she was in. "I loved that book!" she might say. "I hated that book!" she might also say. Either way, however, the next thing she'd say was, "What do I read next?" That trust is extremely gratifying. In my new job, the most gratifying part is helping raise awareness of what happens at the "last three feet," that mysterious place where a book finally leaves the publishing industry's possession and enters a reader's world.

BDB: What's the worst part?

RG: Lack of respect and understanding for what happens at the "last three feet."

BDB: Advice for authors?

RG: You want to find your best readers. Every author does. You know they are out there because you wrote this book for them. Just remember that some of your best readers could be handsellers, and they know how to reach many more of your best readers. It's the loveliest pyramid scheme going.

Learn more about Robert Gray's services and read his blog at www.fresheyesnow.com

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BARBARA DEMARCO-BARRETT, editor of The ASJA Monthly, is Southern California chapter president. She hosts Writers on Writing, a weekly show on KUCI-FM, and wrote Pen on Fire: A Busy Woman's Guide to Igniting the Writer Within (Harcourt, 2004), which won the 2005 ASJA Outstanding Book Award, Service/Self-help. Learn more at www.penonfire.com.