Saying Goodbye to a Set of Shelves – a Guest Post from Stacey Agdern

We started a new feature called Locally Sourced Romance, and one of the bookstores I would have featured almost immediately was Posman’s Books in Grand Central Station, New York. I signed books at Posman’s, and wrote about how Avon’s use of the cover art on the spines of their books made them very eye-catching on the shelves there. Posman’s had a small romance section, but it was an excellent romance section.

Unfortunately, Posman’s Grand Central Terminal location closed on 31 December 2014. Stacey Agdern was the mastermind of the romance section there, and I asked her to write about saying goodbye to her part of the store, and about what makes for a strong and valuable romance selection in any bookstore.

I’ve fallen in love with many people and things in my life. I’m a part of a bunch of different fandoms, from music artists to actors to television shows. I read widely and happily about things and people and places that I love. But I never expected to fall in love with a bunch of shelves.

It was small when I first saw it, being taken care of by someone who didn’t really know what they were doing. But I saw the potential of that small corner of shelves. I knew what those shelves were missing. And when the person in charge didn’t come in to work, I took over as much as I could. It was a struggle at first; I was a romance fan, fighting an uphill battle in a traditionally independent bookstore.

It wasn’t that long until the customers started to realize that something was different.  That there was someone there who spoke their language.  Who didn’t preface their answers to their questions with the traditional “I don’t read that stuff.”  Who in fact, said “Oh, I loved that book.  Yes.  You need the one with that heroine over there.  That’s next.”

Once they realized that, it didn’t take them long to start buying more books.  Sales increased in that small corner of the store.  And that was when it started.  That was when I was given control of the romance section at the Posman Books recently closed Grand Central location.

It’s been a month since the store closed, and yet the memories of it are vivid in my mind.  At the very first event I was sent to, I met Sandra Kitt , who was attending in a capacity that wasn’t ‘groundbreaking romance author,’ but that’s how I recognized her.

Then I started to attend local conferences, I began to befriend other authors, who were suddenly willing to come and visit me at the bookstore.  The first time Eloisa James came to sign, I nearly lost it; I was so excited.  And let’s not discuss how I reacted to Julia London’s unexpected arrival when I was in the midst of organizing…

Over the years, other authors from all parts of the country (Gini Koch, Molly Harper, Kevin Hearne, Victoria Dahl) and the world (Ann Aguirre, Anna Campbell, Nalini Singh) came to visit.

I met more of my idols(Suzanne Brockmann!!!), shared moments with friends as they were able to sign their very first books (Maya Rodale, Sara Lindsey) . I also was thrilled to host an author who hit a major milestone the week after signing at the store.  I won’t take credit for Megan Hart’s making the New York Times best seller list, but I was deliriously excited to be a part of it in some small way.

And as authors from all over came in to visit, so did readers.  Readers from as far afield as Australia, England and Germany came to buy books they’d been wanting to read (or have in print) for years!

How did I do all of this?

Rule one: if you are enjoying what you are reading, you are never in my way.  

That applied to when I was shelving or organizing or anything I was doing in the romance section.  The only customers that were ever told they were in my way were the ones that were disparaging the genre in front of others who were enjoying it. Period.  No exceptions.  The section was a safe space and I wanted to keep it that way.

Rule two: Backlist. BACKLIST. Backlist!

Books in a series will NEVER get read or sold if you don’t have the whole series.  The reason you have book three of a series still sitting on a shelf is because you don’t have the first two.  Readers also love to read a full list of an author’s books.  I had tons of customers who would go through authors’ backlists (in their entirety) after reading just one book.

Rule three: Pay attention to your customer base. 

My rule was always never buy something that you can’t picture 5 customers reading. No matter how much you like it (or don’t like it).  That was a hard lesson to learn, especially when things I loved weren’t popular among the customers, or the trend books that were ordered on a larger scale only sold one copy (and there were many sitting in the back that I did NOT order).  It does not matter what is popular, only what your customers will buy. 

Rule four: Pay attention to the genre.

Don’t be afraid to experiment.  Sometimes spaghetti does stick to the wall when you throw it.  But do it smartly.  Don’t order 50 copies of a book that you think may or may not sell. Unless you know that the genre has a rabid fanbase that will jump fifty feet and run backwards while blindfolded to see a print edition of that book in a store – in that case, go for it.

If you do it right, you end up not with shelves, but with a community.  You meet good friends when they decide to come to events, and you get to host them at their book signings.  You share experiences that are good and bad, anything from great new books to mourning the losses of favorite authors.  And, you get placed on a list of good romance sections throughout the country so that people searching for community can find you.

The romance section at Posman Boooks in Grand Central Terminal became that kind of community.  How do you say goodbye to that?

Like fandoms I no longer participate in, television shows no longer on the air, musicians whose music no longer remains on the airwaves, the community created through the Romance Section at Posman Books Grand Central lives on still.  In memories, in friendships I hold close, and in signed books by authors whose writing  I adore.  Thanks to all of you who helped make these memories.

If you’d like to contact Stacey, you’re welcome to email her, as she is still on the hunt for a new book-related job. And to everyone who was a fan and a customer of Posman’s in Grand Central Terminal, Stacey says, “Thank you.”