Your Books, Our Shelves
We are proud of our history in supporting authors from the local area and have always carried a wide variety of self-published, small press and print-on-demand titles. Locally published books often feature amongst our best selling titles each year. However, we are unable to satisfy the recent and unprecedented increase in demand, by self-published authors, for our shelf space and have made the decision to only stock titles that suit the demand of our customer base: Non-fiction titles of local interest
If you have published a non-fiction title with a strong local interest and would like to see your work on our shelves please see here for our Terms and Conditions.
Why we are no longer stocking all self-published titles
We have witnessed an ever widening gap between requests to stock books, against a diminishing customer interest in self-published titles. Over an 18-month period we pulled together some facts
- Less than 2% of self-published fiction that we stock, sells from our shelves.
- Only a negligible number of self published children’s titles ever sell.
- 99% of self-published authors who approach Red Lion Books are unknown to us, as customers, so whilst they are local they are not necessarily shopping for books locally or independently. This fact was particularly interesting and not one we fully understand. We are interested in knowing where self published authors buy their own books.
- 99% of local, non-fiction interest titles sell. They don’t all ‘sell out’ but those that do sell see huge success and have often been in our bestselling list.
- During this period we asked authors to collect books after a 6-month period (as requested in the terms), but less than 10% of authors came back to us, and this was after us chasing. This has always been the case and has resulted in us storing titles for years after the agreed period. A very high percentage never contact us again despite us having their books. This can make our shelves (and your published work) look tired.
This hasn’t been an easy decision because we know how much heart and courage goes into writing and publishing a book and we genuinely admire anyone who takes that step but as booksellers at the end of the publishing journey, the reality is that self-published fiction rarely sells for us.
Competing with titles that have been traditionally published, often with superior quality binding, professionally designed covers and realistic marketing budgets is extremely difficult. This doesn’t mean your book won’t sell elsewhere.
General points
- We can only discuss your book via email. We cannot discuss your book in person, on our shopfloor, which is dedicated to customers
- If you are not a regular customer of Red Lion Books, then we strongly encourage you to pay us a visit to get a feel for the character of the shop and the community we are in as well as the types of books we do and do not stock. If you are not local, we suggest you contact an independent bookshop in your area because our shelf space is limited
- If you need to contact us with regard to stocking your book, your book sales or to let us know about any promotional activity you are planning, please do so by email at us@redlionbooks.co.uk as you will appreciate we are on the shop floor and can’t always give you our full attention at the desk or by telephone during opening hours. Our priority on the shop floor is to customers
- Your book should be professionally bound, finished, edited and have an ISBN for us to accept it. Exceptions may be made, but remember that your book will be compared to all the other titles in our store. Having a spine helps its visibility. Your book also needs to be comparably priced to other titles of its size and genre.
- We do not generally carry books published by Amazon or their subsidiaries such as CreateSpace. Amazon has done irreparable damage to independent bookshops across the country and does not make a fair contribution to society through their international tax avoidance strategies. There are many choices out there to help you publish your book. Please take that into consideration before you sign on with any self publishing business.
- We cannot guarantee to stock every book that is offered to us. There is an enormous number of authors in and around Colchester and our space is limited. Please don’t be offended if we cannot find space for your book – it may be that it is simply not appropriate for our stock range and customer profile or that we already have similar titles – but it might be just right for somewhere else.
- We do not generally run events in the shop to launch self-published books but if our diary and staffing allows there may be the possibility for you to hire our space. We can only support a few books in this way each year and we have to select those which are most likely to appeal to our customers.
- We have a standard approach to stocking self-published books by local authors which include a ‘sale or return’ arrangement and a normal stocking period of six months. To find our more please email us@redlionbooks.co.uk
- Once we have accepted your book you will be issued with a reference number and we ask that you don’t deliver books without this number otherwise you risk them being turned away. With 20,000 titles in store it is imperative that this reference number is used so that we can keep track of your book. Whenever you deliver it, we ask that it is collected in the following January or July (whichever comes first)
- It is the responsibility of the author/publisher to collect unsold stock at the end of this period. Collection is JULY or JANUARY. This is when outstanding payments are settled. Red Lion Books will not be responsible for reminding the author of this date. If books remain uncollected and no contact is made, the books will be held for one more month and then donated to charity. We cannot be responsible for books stolen or shop soiled during this period
- If you have published a fiction title with an ISBN number and it is listed and readily available with the UK’s main Distributor, Gardners, please supply the ISBN as we may consider stocking it
What you can do to give your book the best chance of finding readers
Encourage your friends, family and others to purchase your books at Red Lion Books.
Contact local media, send out press releases and use social media to get the word out.
Get involved with book clubs, libraries and any other organisations that would be a fit for your book.
The Bookseller’s Association has produced a very useful guide for authors which covers all aspects of getting your book onto the shelves of a High Street Bookshop
Getting-Your-Book-into-a-High-Street-Bookshop
Colchester has a number of writers group including the well established Colchester WriteNight. Link up with them here.