1) Why open an independent bookstore now, when people like Len Riggio are quoted as saying “never in all my years as a bookseller have I seen a retail climate as poor as the one we are in. Nothing even close.”?

I feel like Rebecca and I are operating in a very different environment than Len Riggio is, and his comments, while probably true for Barnes and Noble, aren’t that relevant to us. That said, there’s no denying that the economy makes things difficult, not only for booksellers but for all businesses.  We realize that it might seem a little bit crazy to start a business in this environment.  But counterintuitively, an economic downturn can be the best time to get something started. In a way, everyone is hungry, and the stakes are a bit lower, so there are fewer obstacles to getting started.

And at the same time, we have this incredible community in Fort Greene that is champing at the bit for us to be open!   We’re hoping to create a neighborhood institution that will make enough of a profit to last for a long time, evolve and grow with the times, and give us a decent quality of life.

2) How will Greenlight differ from McNally Jackson?

Being in SoHo, McNally Jackson has a very sophisticated, Manhattan vibe, which has served it very well and makes it a tourist destination as well as a destination for New Yorkers.  Greenlight will be much more of a neighborhood bookstore, a Brooklyn bookstore — smaller, slower, more casual, funkier.

I hope to be able to do a lot more one-on-one handselling with customers, which I sometimes didn’t have time for at McNally Jackson.  We’ve designed Greenlight so that almost all of the business of the bookstore will happen on the bookstore floor, so we’re always where the customers are. We’re also hoping to plan some interactive events — readings, discussions, even open mic nights — that wouldn’t make sense in Manhattan . Other than that, we’ll see as we go along!

3)  You already have a devoted following on Twitter. What would you say to a bookseller who says “but I don’t have time for social media, and I don’t believe it translates into sales”?

Not everything has to have a direct, observable sales correlation to be healthy for your bookstore in the long run.   It’s all part of getting more bodies into our store (or on our website), so we can show them how good we are or what we do.  (And if you shudder at the thought of Twittering yourself, chances are there’s a bookseller on staff who would be willing to tweet on the store’s behalf — maybe they already do!)

4) Will you sell books on your website?

YES!  We think it’s very important as a 21st century bookstore to offer our customers the option of shopping online, even if they use it primarily to see what we have in stock — for now, it’s less about hoping to make big bucks on the online sales and more about the marketing opportunities of e-commerce.  Exciting stuff!

Borders UK has started an online dating service.

Northshire Bookstore in Manchester, Vermont has invited Joann Davis, David Black, Bob Miller, and Debbie Stier to speak about the changing publishing landscape.
Please come if you can! It should be fun. It’s November 7, 2009 from 4-6:30 pm. Then we can go skiing on Sunday

Apparently the Stephen King of Japan has just published his latest book—on toilet paper.

(Special thanks for Christine M. Chung for this link)

I was on a panel at the NYU Publishing course yesterday, along with Ellen Archer, Judith Curr, Jamie Raab and George Gibson (Michael Cader moderated). It’s always amazing to look out at the sea of bright young faces attending these courses. My first thought was “I hope that there are places for all of these people in our shrinking business.” My second thought is that “the crowd appears to be ninety percent female.” This is typical, but it’s a shame that we don’t attract more of a balance of genders. Women are known to be bigger readers, and seem to adapt easily to publishing’s need for collaborative behavior. But at the risk of stereotyping further, why do others think this is the trend? Is it a problem? If so, what should we do about it?

As soon as I heard about DailyLit, I knew it was going to be a hit. There is no question in my mind that serving up books to readers – either through mobile devices or on their computers — is part the future of publishing. HarperStudio successfully experimented with DailyLit as a marketing opportunity for our first three books.

The effort resulted in the following:

–WHO IS MARK TWAIN?: 1013 subscriptions

–BURN THIS BOOK: 529 subscriptions

–EMERIL AT THE GRILL: 751 subscriptions

And if anyone out there hasn’t tried a book on DailyLit, you really must. You’ll be surprised at how fast they go down.

I asked Susan Danziger, the founder of DailyLit, a few questions:

1) What’s the biggest surprise you’ve found about your readers?

Our readers tend to be passionate, engaged readers 60% of whom have read between 10 and over 50 books in the last year (more than I’ve managed to do without DailyLit!)

2) Are most people reading fiction or non-fiction?

Most people are reading fiction since we started with classic, fiction books and then introduced non-fiction with contemporary works such as business series from Tom Peters and Seth Godin, language courses from Berlitz, and recipes from Emeril’s cookbook.

3) What’s been your most popular book and why?

Pride and Prejudice (available for free) has been the most popular book; no surprise that it’s been a huge hit.

4) Are most people reading DailyLit on their phones or computers? (not sure you can tell this)

Most people have been reading DailyLit on their computers at home or at work. We have a number of folks who read books via email so that their bosses think they’re reading work-related emails; others who read on their mobile phone while at Starbucks or even while brushing teeth in their bathroom, and even one fellow who reads in bed to avoid sex with his wife!

5) When we first spoke a year ago, publishers were nervous about giving you these books DRM-free. Has that evolved at all?

Yes, publishers are definitely less concerned about the DRM issue these days. Since each of our books are divided into up to hundreds of installments, publishers have interpreted that as its own kind of DRM. Also, publishers realize that DailyLit is a great way to virally market their titles. For instance, we integrated with Twitter so that if you link your DailyLit profile to your Twitter account, books you start reading will be automatically tweeted to your followers. The first book we launched with this program in place, Who is Mark Twain?, let over 17,600 followers (from 33 tweets) know about that book in a period of 2-3 days (and according to my contact over at Powells.com, it made their bestseller list!)

DailyLit (www.dailylit.com) is the leading publisher of serialized books in digital form. DailyLit currently features over 1400 classic and contemporary books available for free or for a small fee. Short book installments are sent via e-mail or RSS feed and arrive in a reader’s inbox (or RSS feedreader), which can be read on a desktop, laptop or mobile device (including an iPhone or Blackberry) according to the schedule set by each reader (e.g. 7:00am every weekday). Installments can be read in fewer than 5 minutes, and additional installments are available on demand. DailyLit’s titles include bestselling and award winning titles, from literary fiction and non-fiction to romance and science fiction. Co-founded by a team of publishing professionals and technology experts, DailyLit is headquartered in Mamaroneck, New York.