We’ve told you about the anxiety at Barnes & Noble over this upcoming holiday retail season, which Leonard Riggio predicted would be the worst of his 40-plus-year career. But we’ve also told you about the Indiebound campaign to rally independent booksellers… and they aren’t the only ones trying to eliminate the negative.
PW reported earlier this week on Random House‘s “Books=Gifts” ad campaign, and several book bloggers have banded together to create a “Buy Books for the Holidays” blog. Add a major online promotional effort from M.J. Rose to that mix: As Random was unveiling their banners, Rose outlined a 31-day campaign that promises “a half a billion impressions across some of the most popular blogs,” with a reach of over 10 million readers. And she’s looking ahead: “We’re also planning on doing the same thing for Valentines Day, Mother’s Day and Father’s Day,” she reports.
The heart of her call for proactive solutions for the slowly dwindling book market bears underlining:
“Our industry needs to do more not less in this economy—this is the time to spend money not hold back—we need to shout that books are still reasonably priced as gifts rather than whisper it. We can’t just hope consumers get the message.”