Bookstore thoughts.

These aren't serious complaints. I'm really having fun at Pegasus, finally seeing people respond to our selection. 

 

It's so interesting to me that people open specialty bookstores. A general bookstore is already "special" enough. In my experience, you need all the customers you can get. Why exclude any of them, much less narrow your reach to a small subset of what is already a small subset? You can still specialize, the way I do genre books, but why cut out a whole audience?

 

And while I'm on the excluding thing, I'm amazed by how limited most bookstores' genre selections are, especially SF/Fantasy, but including mysteries, romance, and horror. (Most stores don't even have a horror section.) I know that I'm inclined that way, but we sell a lot of genre books.

 

Had a guy in yesterday who just insisted I was leaving a ton of money on the table by not selling online. This despite the fact that he could look around my store and see the hordes of customers milling about. I mean, hordes. Hugely busy day. I was already exhausted when he said that.

I mean, how many hours and how much energy do I have? It's a bit like telling a guy who works a 48 hours week that he could make "so much more money" by working 64 hours a week! 

I'll say it again and again and again: Time, Space, and Energy ARE money. Period.

The funny thing is, this was a guy who'd retired at the age of 52. (Hey, you could make so much more money if you were working!)

A couple of days ago, an older couple was telling me how the store in their hometown sold coffee and this and that and the next things. Again, the store was packed with customers, who I'm barely keeping up with. I pause a moment and say, "You know want?"

They look at me expectantly. 

"I....just want to sell  (#@&%*) books."

Fortunately, they laughed.

 

Most frustrating thing about serving customers: I always, always say, "If you're looking for a title or author, just let me know." Ninety percent of the time, they'll shrug it off. But here's the thing: when they actually do ask for a title, I have a very strong hit rate. More often than not, I have the book in stock.

Sometimes they're headed for the door before I finally coax them to tell me what they were looking for...and it seems like when that happens, I always have the book.

I mean, there is only so much I can do. I offer, and sometimes mildly repeat it if I sense they're actually looking for something. But I can't pester them.

Teenagers especially will almost never ask.  (It's a secret...)

And then there are the customers who ask for a book, I show it to them. They ask for another book, I show it to them, they ask for another book, I show it to them.

They leave. 

That was fun. 

And finally, the people who ask for recommendations. I gets all enthusiastic about a particular book, they hold it in their hands, squint at it skeptically, and then hand it back. 

I love people, really I do.