Fuze champions the efforts and initiatives of independent bookstores and is especially beholden to businesses that carry and support our books. Lately it has appeared that these small enterprises were going the way of the dinosaur as the big block chains and Amazon conspired to make them extinct. However, the public rallied, as well as notable forces such as the American Booksellers Association, and independent storefronts are here to stay to bring quality books to avid readers.
As an “Indie” publisher, we appreciate our symbiosis with independent bookstores. They support our authors by hosting readings and personally recommending our books, and we try to send readers to their stores to purchase books. We are pleased to distill the following conclusion from a recent article in Publishers Weekly written by Judith Rosen:
Announcements of the death of the Indie bookstore are premature! Recently the stores are reporting healthy sales numbers-up a respectable 8% in 2012, and the ABA’s [American Booksellers Association] membership has increased for the fourth year in a row! Having added 65 new stores, independents have increased in the past year to almost 2000 locations.
Becky Anderson, outgoing president of the ABA told her colleagues at their recent convention in NYC that booksellers and publishers must invest in one another for both to survive. We at Fuze feel that advice must extend to small, independent publishers as well, who are fighting for the survival of all the unusual books that fall outside the mainstream.
