For the third year in a row, Bookpeople, Austin, Tex., is celebrating the Catalan holiday St. George's Day by having a staff handselling contest of Random House backlist titles during April. On St. George's Day, or the Day of the Book, held April 23, people give loved ones a rose and a book.
For the contest, Bookpeople booksellers pick favorites from a list of slow performers at the store, then create staff selections and all books are put on display in the store for the month. The bookseller who sells the most copies of his or her book receives some free books from Random. The contest was originally suggested by the store's Random sales reps, Liz Sullivan and Gianna Lamorte.
The first year 14 employees participated and sold more than $800 of books from the display. Elizabeth Jordan, buyer and inventory operations supervisor, noted that one of the titles had never been carried in the store before the contest and has in the past two years sold 120 copies.
Last year 21 employees participated and sold $2,000 worth of books in April. Jordan estimated that the contests have resulted overall in sales of almost $15,000 and almost 1,000 books.
For this year's contest, 35 booksellers are participating. Already last week, even before April began, they sold more than 40 books for a total of $640--and are on track to "blow last year's results out of the water," Jordan said.