Ecurb
04-17-2015, 06:28 PM
Two friends of mine own a local bookstore here in Eugene. The store is having its 40th birthday next month, and I volunteered to help out. I've written advertising copy and done PR work professionally before, but never for a bookstore. I wonder if any of the bibliophiles here at LitNet have any good ideas or suggestions.
Here are my basic plans so far (I just volunteered today):
1) Pitch the local daily, weekly and University newspapers on running a story on the event. I'd call up the appropriate editors -- but I need to come up with some angles to pitch. The Weekly may be easy -- they're a liberal paper, and I think the angle would be: dozens of bookstores have closed down in the past decade or two because of competition from the national chains (better prices) and the internet. One bookstore has not! Here's how they've survived. By the way: buy local. The daily and the university newspapers might be tougher -- if anyone has a good idea for an "angle" to pitch, I'd appreciate it. I looked it up: 15 years ago there were more than 10,000 independent bookstores in the U.S. -- now there are 1200.
2) Pitch the local radio and TV stations (same thing).
3) Send a postcard and/or email to everyone on the store's mailing list inviting them to the Birthday Bash and offering some kind of discount. My idea is a volume discount (to get people to buy more): Buy 5 books -- get one free! (Something like that.) We could suck up to those invited: "I know you're the kind of person who feels the same way about bookstores that some people feel about jewelry shops...."
“The Bookshop has a thousand books,
All colors, hues, and tinges,
And every cover is a door
That turns on magic hinges.”
― Nancy Byrd Turner
4) Possibly write a bio of the owner, and his glories and disasters in the bookstore business over 40 years. Then send it to the media.
5) Pitch the media on the VALUE of local, independent bookstores as promoters of reading, of civilized values, of intellectual discourse, and of community in ways that the internet (and even chains) can never be
Has anyone here worked in bookstores? Do you have any brilliant ideas for me -- maybe things that worked well in your stores?
Here are my basic plans so far (I just volunteered today):
1) Pitch the local daily, weekly and University newspapers on running a story on the event. I'd call up the appropriate editors -- but I need to come up with some angles to pitch. The Weekly may be easy -- they're a liberal paper, and I think the angle would be: dozens of bookstores have closed down in the past decade or two because of competition from the national chains (better prices) and the internet. One bookstore has not! Here's how they've survived. By the way: buy local. The daily and the university newspapers might be tougher -- if anyone has a good idea for an "angle" to pitch, I'd appreciate it. I looked it up: 15 years ago there were more than 10,000 independent bookstores in the U.S. -- now there are 1200.
2) Pitch the local radio and TV stations (same thing).
3) Send a postcard and/or email to everyone on the store's mailing list inviting them to the Birthday Bash and offering some kind of discount. My idea is a volume discount (to get people to buy more): Buy 5 books -- get one free! (Something like that.) We could suck up to those invited: "I know you're the kind of person who feels the same way about bookstores that some people feel about jewelry shops...."
“The Bookshop has a thousand books,
All colors, hues, and tinges,
And every cover is a door
That turns on magic hinges.”
― Nancy Byrd Turner
4) Possibly write a bio of the owner, and his glories and disasters in the bookstore business over 40 years. Then send it to the media.
5) Pitch the media on the VALUE of local, independent bookstores as promoters of reading, of civilized values, of intellectual discourse, and of community in ways that the internet (and even chains) can never be
Has anyone here worked in bookstores? Do you have any brilliant ideas for me -- maybe things that worked well in your stores?