Bookstore visits.

Did my little local bookstore circuit that I do once in awhile. Dropping in and talking to some of the owners.

It's very different than it used to be. Up until recently, the owners of local stores weren't particularly friendly toward me. I don't know if they just didn't like me or thought I was a threat or thought my store was beneath them.

But the current crop of booksellers are all friendly. Part of it is that I've survived 36 years in a tough business. I'm more than willing to share my experience, for what it's worth. (I have to be careful not to overdo it or be a know-it-all.) I'd love to save them from some of the mistakes I made.

Anyway, it's always nice to talk about books to simpatico people. It's what I miss most about not being at Pegasus full-time.

My manager, Sabrina, and I sat down yesterday and talked over the year-end results and what to do going forward. I was frankly surprised that we did as well as we did. 8 out of 12 months were below last year, and yet our sales were down only slightly overall. Every category was up except comics.

Even better, I managed to compensate for the drop in that one category by building up the others. This has been long in the planning and execution and worked perfectly.

The store is more or less self-sustaining, due to the inventory, and we need to keep that going. What we'll be focusing on is a budget--more an awareness of budget--I'm a great believer in busting budgets if need be.

This is more an art than a science. When can I stop buying and when should I be buying more? It often isn't reflected by current sales but more of a sense of how much good inventory I have, where the trends are, and how much risk can I take.

 I still really enjoy the challenge.