Great Businesses for Bookworms
Jan Dean and
I became friends because of our mutual love of books. Several years ago,
Jan was doing conferences and workshops in northern Texas on starting
a home based business. She ordered Winning
Ways, the newsletter which I publish, and promptly wrote me a
charming letter telling me about her affection for
84,
Charing Cross Road, which I had mentioned in that issue. That
love of reading and our joint passion for everything English has kept
our friendship going for over a decade. When I did seminars in Dallas,
Jan and I always planned time together — time that usually involved
at least one bookstore visit.
Last year,
Jan told me one of her goals for the year was to learn about book collecting.
Her enthusiasm was contagious and I began reading about book collecting,
too, and promptly realized a potential (and natural) profit center waiting
to be born.
Like many
avid readers, Jan has found a way to share her love with others. She is
the author of The Gardener's Reading Guide, which lists hundreds
of books on all aspects of gardening. Her passion for cozy mysteries led
her to start a specialized newsletter called Murder Most Cozy,
which shares news about this genre. Every year, Jan leads a tour to England
that is designed especially for other cozy lovers. Here's a bit of what
the tour brochure promises:
The Cozy
Crimes & Cream Teas tour was created so you can truly experience
the picturesque English villages where many cozies are set. You will
fall in love with Burford, Chipping Campden, Bibury, Stow-on-the-Wold,
and many other tiny and not-so-tiny Cotswold villages. In addition,
you will have a chance to meet and chat with the English authors who
write the cozy mysteries.
Obviously,
Jan has found a wonderful niche in the vast world of books. If you're
a bookworm, perhaps you, too, can find a way to combine your love of books
with a nifty profit center. Here are some ideas to get you started.
Read
for a living. Kathy Baxter is a professional librarian who has
found several outlets for sharing her expertise. For years, Kathy has
been a popular speaker on the subject of books and kids. She regularly
delivers book talks to other librarians, teachers, parents and schoolchildren.
After Kathy submitted an article about her approach to giving booktalks
to Library Journal, the industry publication, her visibility
as an expert expanded even more. Not only did the magazine like her article
enough to publish it, they asked her to do a regular column which now
appears in that publication and is called "The Nonfiction Booktalker."
Kathy has also written a book called Gotcha! Getting Kids Excited
About Books. In addition, Kathy is a founder of the
Maud
Hart Lovelace Society, a national organization that brings together
lovers of the Betsy-Tacy books.
There are
numerous other ways to turn reading time into bottom line. For instance,
many newspapers use freelancers to read and review new books. Film producers
and some publishers use the services of reader's advisers to comb through
piles of manuscripts and make recommendations about those that seem feasible
for production.
Then there's
the business started by Linda Seger, who describes herself as a script
consultant. "There were so many people in the movie business who
wrote, produced or made decisions about developing a film," she explains,
"but there was no one to come in and spot problems in the script
from an objective viewpoint. That's what I do. I troubleshoot scripts."
She now works with more than 150 clients a year who pay her anywhere from
$750 to $3,000 for her advice. In addition, she conducts seminars and
has written a book for others who would like to start a similar service.
Sell
books. Next to opening a restaurant, running a dear little bookstore
seems to be the most popular business fantasy around. As every booklover
knows, independent bookselling has become a most unstable occupation.
(Of course, if you have your heart set on it and financial backing, by
all means ignore this warning.) Even in this age of superstores and Amazon,
specialty booksellers with a bit of imagination can carve out a place
for themselves.
Collette Morgan
opened a children's bookstore called Wild Rumpus in Minneapolis with the
intention of making her store "something a corporate mind would never
dream up and that a large company could never sustain." Her bookstore
sells children a good time along with books and is thriving despite competition
from the chains.
That's just
what Debbie Cravens did. After she left her job at the Wisconsin Historical
Society, where she'd been a book buyer and done searches for out-of-print
books, she found that "I could not not sell books." That led
her to start a business to do searches, which eventually became a business
specializing in gardening books. That turned into a mail order business
called Wood Violet Books, although Debbie does a great deal of marketing
through garden fairs, as well. Thanks to the Internet, Debbie says she's
doing more book searches than ever — and finding it easier to track
down elusive titles.
Because the
world of books is so huge, those wishing to market books would be wise
to find a niche and become highly specialized. For many years, Jan Longone
has operated a successful mail order bookstore devoted to culinary subjects,
tracking down books from around the world. Without ever advertising or
even owning a fax machine, Jan's Wine and Food Library, located in Ann
Arbor, Michigan, has built a devoted clientele, including Julia Child
and the late M.F.K. Fisher. "This business suits me perfectly,"
she says. "We're surrounded by good books, good food, travel and
we've made friends around the world."
Travel, cooking,
scholarly, architectural and mystery specialty shops have flourished in
many places; a mail order and/or Internet counterpart could offer opportunities
to those wishing to specialize.
Antiquarian
and other book specialists also market through book fairs and other book-related
events, as well as conventions, special meetings and conferences. If you
market childrearing books, for instance, setting up shop at parenting
conferences is a logical way to build your business. And, of course, selling
books is a natural add-on profit center for many kinds of businesses.
While booksellers
may not become fabulously wealthy, most agree that one of the great bonuses
in selling books is that it brings them in contact with others who share
their passion — making business the pleasure it should be.
There's
more where this came from.
Order Winning Ways now!
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