National Bookshop Day attracts national media coverage, ‘bookshop selfies’
The fourth National Bookshop Day on Saturday 9 August attracted national media coverage and trended on twitter, particularly with ‘bookshop selfies’, Australian Booksellers Association (ABA) CEO Joel Becker told Books+Publishing.
The event was covered in the ABC, Sydney Morning Herald and SmartCompany, as well as local media outlets. Becker also praised the efforts of ‘our fantastic Australian publishing industry, who got behind [the day] with some great social media’.
‘Fairfield Books described the day as one of their biggest Saturdays for a long time,’ said Becker. Customers at Fairfield Books in Melbourne were treated to mini cupcakes and muffins as they wrote the titles of their favourite books on coloured tags and stuck them on the bookstore’s window. Visiting authors included Carole Wilkinson, Anna Branford, Jen Storer, Kylie Ladd, Michael Pryor and Corinne Fenton.
The Hill of Content in Melbourne transformed its window into a reading spot, where customers could sit on a lounge chair, read their favourite book and snack on tea and biscuits. Customers who posted a ‘bookshop selfie’ on Facebook went into a draw to win a $50 gift voucher.
A pug party was held at Avid Reader Bookshop in Brisbane, where pug owners posed for photos with their dogs and a copy of Aaron Blabey’s Pig the Pug (Scholastic) to receive a 10% discount on purchases. (See pictures here, here and here.) Authors Nick Earls, Sally Piper and Susan Johnson worked behind the tills and gift-wrapped books.
Dymocks Chermside in Brisbane ran a ‘guess how many books are in our shop’ competition. Each customer who purchased a book on the day could enter the competition to win a prize back of books worth $735. The store also ran competition for customers to post ‘bookshop selfies’ on Facebook to win book packs.
Readings in Melbourne asked customers to take a ‘selfie’ in the store and share it on social media using the hashtag #readingsselfie to win one of five $100 gift vouchers. The store also ran a storytime session with the characters from Julia Donaldson and Axel Scheffler’s The Gruffalo (Pan Macmillan).
Pages & Pages in Sydney celebrated the day with the authors working as booksellers. Tristan Bancks, Jacqueline Harvey and Susanne Gervay worked in the children’s store among others, while the adult store saw P M Newton, Malla Nunn and Richard Beasley and other authors behind the tills. The store gave a free copy of The Unknown Unknown: Bookshops and the Delight of Not Getting What You Wanted by Mark Forsyth to the first 50 customers of the day.
Better Read Than Dead in Sydney held a high tea event with authors Liane Moriarty, Jaclyn Moriarty and Nicola Moriarty. Staff dressed in bookish costumes and asked customers to write out their favourite book titles on the leaves of its National Bookshop Day Tree to win a prize.
Dymocks in Adelaide sold packs of eight Allen & Unwin titles for $5 each, with all proceeds going to the Indigenous Literacy Foundation. All Dymocks chain stores gave members of its loyalty program double points for purchases on the day.
Tags: abanationalbookshopday
Category: Local news
