Bookselling as a Hobby and a Proftable Business
For a lot of independent booksellers, living each day with books is a sacred vocation. Through the years, historians and philosophers try to understand what is it that such addiction makes books for a passion.
In the old days, collectors became integral selling antiquitarian, out of print and rare books then as a hobby and lifestyle. Then came the idea of why not help the community, recycle and even buy or sell books as a source of income. A lot of creative people considered such passion a daily vocation as it was the experience of going to bookstores, scouting, indexing and even packaging books as a career.
When the internet and e-commerce age came, a new era was born in this industry. Not only did people got more educated why they do it, what will it take to make money, retire, raise a family and even help the community. I say this because I really commend independent booksellers as they are the pillars, examples and also some of the smartest entrepreneurs I have seen.
However, with the new era of internet technology, it totally change consumer behavior as people bought online not just because it was sometimes cheaper. People bought not merely for adventure and excitement but they saw the logic and value of technology. The old bookselling schools teach that we need to transform our hobby into a real profitable business which is totally understandable. However, when we teach these philosophies we have a habit of still teaching the old techniques of scouting for the bargains, thrift stores and treasure hunts in order that we can make money and profit in "bookzelling".
Unfortunately, I totally disagree on this logic. Mathematicians and even scientists can formulate and hypothesize that when you add up all the cost factors between buying a book online than scouting for it the whole day might actually convert that it is a lot beneficial and economical to purchasing online unless the threshold value is really high and the profitability is affected.
It is now the 22nd century. The new millenium is that our customers can become also our vendors and suppliers so that we can strategically be empowered and become successful. This is why a lot of online independent sellers would not rather grow and open up their businesses to aspiring capitalist and investors. For them control is an important factor as they not only control their livelihood, their passions and their social responsibility.
Yet, what I have seen through the years that a lot of the independent sellers actually behave each day and moment as they were accountable to shareholders. These can be seen on their spending behaviors, their lifestyle, their community involvement and even their spirituality.
Today, bookselling heads towards a new direction of profitability. It would be wise to ask independent sellers why they do things the way they do it as they will be more than happy to share. However, checking each other's actions, analyzing their behaviors and formulating hypothesis will simply be a waste of time.
After all, this is our lifeblood which we had built from blood and sweat and most booksellers will do everything to protect their interest and their trade secrets. Because if they don't then they would rather have a non-profit organization than a viable business model.
The good news is that a lot of booksellers are now more numbers oriented as they now understand the impact of not being educated on this matter. But, my sense is that every bookseller enters the industry because they have a bigger role they want to achieve for themselves, their family, their community, their faith and even their country.
It is about time that financial and investing experts really try to understand the mechanics of this business even before they even start showing their ratios and valuations that a bookselling business cannot be viable and profitable.
http://www.alex-esguerra.com
" We transform the antiquarian bookselling industry from the concept of first editions and classics to long time value added literary books in the like of Charles Dickens, Ernest Hemingway, and the likes ".
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