** From Jan Murphy to Helen Fleischer on 02 Jul 96  10:24:52
 ** McCrumb and other cross-over writers
 JM> Well, here's the bookseller's dilemma.
 JM> We started out as a specialty shop with mostly science fiction, though
 JM> we did carry some mysteries if they were written by authors who also
 JM> did science fiction (e.g. Asimov's mysteries, Boucher's _Rocket to the
 JM> Morgue_, Dick Lupoff's mystery series, Ted Sturgeon and Jack Vance's
 JM> Ellery Queen titles, and so on).  So we also had _Bimbos of the Death
 JM> Sun_ and _Zombies of the Gene Pool_.
 JM> Then we started carrying more mysteries if they had some sort of
 JM> "twist" that would make them interesting to readers of science
 JM> fiction.  Mostly this started out as historical mysteries like M K
 JM> Wren's (another crossover author) and Ellis Peters' Brother Cadfaels
 JM> and so on.
 JM> Then we said, well, heck, they've reprinted Dorothy Sayers and how can
 JM> we NOT stock these since we're carrying mysteries too.  And so on.
 JM> Then we had a bunch of customers stop in who were really interested in
 JM> the mysteries only, so to save them the trouble of pawing through the
 JM> umptey-bump cases of SF to dig out the handful of mysteries, we gave
 JM> the mysteries their own (albeit small) shelf in the store.
 JM> Now what do we do with the books by McCrumb which are neither mystery
 JM> or SF?
    Either don't stock them, or put them somewhere obscure, like a shelf
 in the stockroom.
 JM> We face a similar problem with the romances -- we started out as a
 JM> lark by carrying a series of romances with a ghost in them, on the
 JM> grounds that it was fantasy because it was a ghost story.  They sold
 JM> like hotcakes.  Now we are seeing more and more publishers sending us
 JM> fantasy or science fiction-related romances, mostly time travel
 JM> stories, or vampire ones.  And we've always had a smattering of
 JM> romances anyhow, again, stuff written by science fiction and fantasy
 JM> writers which we've had for their associational value, since some
 JM> readers want to read EVERYTHING their favorite writer does no matter
 JM> what category this is.
    There is a strong crossover market among SF fans for romances,
 largely due to the influence of Georgette Heyer.  Regency Dances and
 Heyer Teas are popular items at a number of SF conventions.  Carrying
 Regencies and the like makes a certain amount of sense, though I
 personally would draw the line at Harlequins.
 JM> Ideally, we'd like the fans of writer X to be able to find these books
 JM> and buy them if they tickle their fancy.  If they don't know that
 JM> writer X has written in other categories, they won't go looking in the
 JM> other section.  If we put up signs (shelf-talkers, as they are called
 JM> in the trade) directing readers to the other sections, we will have so
 JM> many shelf-talkers, they'll just become a big blur and customers won't
 JM> read them.
 JM> So what's a bookseller to do?
    What you're doing, more or less.  On a practical level, what you
 stock is probably determined less by theoretical notions of specialty
 and genre, and more by practical considerations of what sells.
    An acquaintance of mine runs a specialty bookstore called SF,
 Mysteries, and More here in NYC.  The name pretty much describes the
 selection: Science Fiction and Mysteries, with "and More" a convenient
 catch-all for the other things he stocks, like techno-thrillers, spy
 novels, and war fact/fiction titles.  He's learned a few things the
 hard way, like the fact that Star Trek and Star Wars novels form a
 healthy percentage of his gross revenue, and doesn't seem to have
 learned some others, like the fact that he probably doesn't sell enough
 comics to justify the retail space or the administrative effort, and
 that books he gets really cheap, like the used books he stocks, aren't
 pure gravy: they take space, require labor, and are just as big a
 liability if they don't sell as the new titles.
    But the question I see is how big an issue your concern really is.
 Yes, there are readers who are fans of particular authors and will want
 to read everything that author has written, regardless of genre,  But
 while it's all very well to want to please your patrons, practical
 considerations arise again.  Do you *sell* enough books outside of your
 focus to make this effort worthwhile?  Can you justify the allocation
 of shelf space (always a too limited quantity) to books outside of your
 specialty?
    I'd take a different approach.  Devote the bulk of your retail space
 and attention to your focus on SF and Mysteries.  Keep a *small* shelf
 of stuff somehow related.  Start a file on your regular customers,
 tracking what sort of things they like.  Start a parallel effort to
 track the authors who do a lot of cross genre work.  Instead of trying
 to carry all the books, carry info sheets on popular authors.  These
 needn't be fancy -- just a list of better known titles, advance notice
 of upcoming releases, if any, and an "Oh, by the way, did you know
 so-and-so also wrote *this* type of book?"  You don't even need to
 stock all that much of the cross-over stuff: just make sure your
 patrons know it exists, and that if you don't have it on stock, you'll
 be happy to order it.  (Computers make this sort of effort far more
 practical than it used to be.)
    Ultimately, specialty bookstores are service businesses.  You can't
 match the big chains on price or selection.  You can do a better job of
 knowing your customers and what they like.
--- Blue Wave/DOS v2.30
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