• Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Login
  • Register
Publishers Lunch logo Publishers Lunch logo
  • Publishers Marketplace
  • Site Guide
  • Help
Login Sign Up
  • Personnel
  • AI
  • Compensation
  • Unions
  • Book Bans
  • New Releases
  • Earnings
  • The Trial
  • Archives
Publishers Lunch logo
  • Publishers Marketplace
  • Site Guide
  • Help
  • Publishers Marketplace
  • Site Guide
  • Help

July 22, 2009By Michael Cader

Bookselling: Target Is Timesworthy

July 22, 2009By Michael Cader

Target’s ability to select and sell titles to its customers that may not be major bestsellers in traditional bookstores is the focus of an NYT feature, which says their Bookmarket club “has highlighted largely unknown writers.” Their picks are focused on trade paperback fiction, and include special designations such as a recent “Hand-Picked Titles From Emerging Authors.”

Among the successful picks, which can sell 50,000 to 150,000 copies at Target alone, have been Michelle Richmond’s The Year of Fog, Meg Waite Clayton’s The Wednesday Sisters, Lisa Genova’s Still Alice, Diane Chamberlain’s The Secret Life of CeeCee Wilkes, and Tatiana de Rosnay’s Sarah’s Key.

A company spokesperson says the focused book selection programs are designed to turn “Target core guests into regular Target book shoppers.” (Last year an NYT feature offered praise for the power of Costco and book buyer Pennie Clark Ianniciello’s “uncanny knack for leading customers to buy books, for molding their taste.” The article said “a forgotten older paperback, recommended and featured by the book buyer at Costco, can sell more copies in six weeks than it did in the last few years combined.” Today’s take is that “the other big-box retailers rely mostly on the biggest commercial books of the moment, though Costco does on occasion offer its own special picks of little-known authors.)
NYT

Filed Under: Bookstores, Free

sidebar

Primary Free Sidebar

Login

Forgot Password Quick Pass User Login
Get Full Access
The Publishing Industry’s Essential Daily Read

Each Publishers Lunch Deluxe subscription includes full access to our searchable multi-year archive of industry news, a nightly email reporting 10 to 50 deal transactions, and our database of industry contacts, scripts, and posting privileges.

Learn More

RSS Automat

  • Sourcebooks Makes Inc.'s Best Workplaces 2025 List June 18, 2025 Magazine list
  • Pearson to Acquire Career and Technical Education Leader eDynamic Learning June 16, 2025 Press Release
  • James Frey Has Rich Friends, and They Like His New Book June 12, 2025 WSJ
  • Leon Levy Foundation Awards $300,000 Grant to the Authors Guild Foundation to Preserve Literary Advocacy Archives June 10, 2025 Authors Guild
  • Trending: Tote Bags That Hold Just A Book June 10, 2025 Elle
  • Hadley, MA B&N Workers OK Union Contract After Two Years of Negotiation June 6, 2025 Daily Hampshire Gazette
  • Authors Guild Update On Albert Whitman Bankruptcy Hearing June 5, 2025 AG post
  • "Frozen Yogurt and Fiction Collide" As Pinkberry Promotes Emily Henry (And Their Limited Flavor, Summer Melon Crush) June 3, 2025 Press release
  • JennaFest Draws 200 Readers; She Says She Is Collaborating On a Screen Project with Elin Hilderbrand June 2, 2025 Today
  • Chicago Sun-Times Investigation Admits Everyone Remotely Connected to Bogus AI Supplement Was Lazy, Greedy, or Both May 30, 2025 Sun-Times
Publishers Marketplace logo

Contact Us

News

  • Publishers Marketplace
  • Report News
  • Discuss
  • Classifieds
  • Rights Offerings

Deals

  • Report A Deal

Books

  • Buzz Books

Jobs

  • Job Board
  • Privacy Policy Terms of Use