A virtuous cycle.

I mentioned yesterday in my "crank" post that I would try to be more positive today.

What I'm noticing in the store is one of those virtuous cycles that occasionally come along, where something that is positive can be used to make something else positive which can be used to make something else positive and onward.

When I came back to work in September of last year, I decided to focus on new books. Books had already been doing surprising well; so much so that I removed "used" books altogether. But I'd been picking the low hanging fruit for years--the easy stuff, the classics, the cult books, the quirky bestsellers. I decided it was time to actually order bestsellers, hardcover bestsellers at that. And while I was at it, I wanted to try to find more room for books without detracting from the rest of the store. 

Surprisingly, I was able to accomplish a bit more room, and when we closed for the pandemic and laid down new flooring, I was able to create even more.

I also decided to get direct accounts, with better discounts, with a couple of major publishers--who probably account for about a third of the books we carry.  

This worked a lot better than I expected. Or maybe it was the plague. (strange to say.) I'm not sure, but new books have literally doubled in sales. 

Well, the influx of money allowed me to start stocking up on toys when they went on sale after the closing. And to fill in holes in Magic. I was able to bring in a full line of Pokemon cards.

Then sales continued to be good, so I decided to go direct with the publisher of the bestselling games, which necessitated that we carry more of them. We had room for that because we have upper shelving that wasn't being used efficiently. 

Anyway, that seemed to help game sales so with Christmas coming, I decided to bring in a full stock of jigsaw puzzles, enamel pins, and standups, which are things I can usually only afford once a year or so.

Last week remained pretty good, so I decided--why not?--to order mainstream games like chess, backgammon, cribbage boards, Monopoly, Scrabble, and so on. Up until now we've mostly carried only "Euro" style games, such as Settlers of Catan and Ticket to Ride. (Most of these mainstream games haven't arrived yet, so we'll see how that goes.)

Anyway, the virtuous cycle is that the increase in sales of books, provided the opportunity to increase Magic and Pokemon, which allowed for more board games, which allowed for more ancillary product, and so on. 

It's always fun, and it always comes to an end, but I'm enjoying it while I can.

All it took is for me to come back to work more often. I've gone from one day to two days to three days plus several hours twice a week for orders. Last week I worked for five days straight (not all day, but partially.) 

So there's that. But so far, I'm having fun.