As Usual, ABA Members Drop; Organization Committed to Educational Efforts At the ABA annual meeting, the membership report went by even more quickly than usual — perhaps because full bookstore members of the organization were down over 9 percent, from 2.097 the year before to 1,908. Provisional members, comprising prospective booksellers, also dropped, from 135 the year before to 90. It’s gotten hard to know, however, if the organization’s membership stats reflect the actuall numbers of booksellers, since as ABA head Avin Domnitz noted, “there are a lot of booksellers who come to this convention and don’t belong to this […]

Who Is (And Isn’t) Here After last year’s broadly enthusiastic and well-attended convention, buoyed by the show’s return to New York after a long absence, this year’s BEA can’t help but be quieter. Add to that continued sales problems for retailers and publishers alike, and you have even quieter expectations. It’s no wonder, then, that much of the early focus this time around will be on who is and isn’t attending. So it’s interesting to note that the biggest no-show is none other than BEA Show Manager Greg Topalian, whose wife Andrea is due to deliver their first child (they […]

BEA News Gets news live from the convention at the PublishersMarketplace.com home page, which will be open to everyone, starting later today. News and deals from the show can be e-mailed to us, or you can come by our PublishersMarketplace.com booth at #4900 in the West Hall and leave word. Also at the boom is your chance to get a tour of all the great features that are packed into PublishersMarketplace, and take advantage of our first-ever membership special — join the site for six months or more and get a very snappy aluminum Publishers Lunch lunchbox free! As noted […]

Important Updates Remember — starting the middle of next week and throughout the convention, all Lunch readers can visit the home page of PublishersMarketplace.com any time for the first and only live coverage of BEA. Highlights will be e-mailed out every morning. News and deals from the show can be e-mailed to us, or you can come by our PublishersMarketplace.com booth at #4900 in the West Hall and leave word. We’ll also be collecting galleys and cool giveaways there for photograph and comment (can anyone beat my favorite Curious George pens from a couple of years ago?). Of course at […]

Important Updates Looking to next week, there will be no Lunch on Monday, and Tuesday is my travel day, so that’s looking iffy as well. Starting Thursday, we’ll be offering the first and only truly live coverage of the BEA convention. News reports will be posted to the home page of PublishersMarketplace.com during the day every day Thursday through Sunday from the convention floor (along with digital photos, event highlights, and more) , and everyone will have access. So use the terminals at the show or the computer in your booth to check back as often as you like and […]

Please Note Yesterday’s edition had an incomplete hyperlink for Amistad Books, publisher of the forthcoming THE KNOWN WORLD. The correct link is: http://www.amistadbooks.com BEA Now, and Then Our cool new BEA Marketplace.com directory will remain live throughout the convention itself, and it will be easily accessible all over the convention center, so you can use it for one-the-spot reference. (Which means exhibitors and rights centers participants should keep adding as much information as possible, and even post news from the floor itself.) Look for banks of terminals in the lobbies of both main halls, which will be set up to […]