From Bookshelf to Bookstore:
What Authors Should Know from Booksellers
Sally Brewster & Katie Mitchell
Join two of Charlotte’s most beloved booksellers—Sally Brewster of Park Road Books and Katie Mitchell of Trope Bookshop—Have you wondered how certain books end up in independent bookstores? With close to 3 million books published each year, how do bookstores decide what to stock?
Have you wondered how certain books end up in independent bookstores? With close to 3 million books published each year, how do bookstores decide what to stock. Sally Brewster and Katie Mitchell will talk about how they stock their stores with new books throughout the year and the buying process within the traditional industry and from the self-publishing world.
There will be an open Q&A, giving attendees a chance to ask their most pressing questions about getting noticed, getting shelved, and building a loyal readership through local indie bookstores. Whether you’re self-published, traditionally published, or somewhere in between, this honest conversation will give you actionable insight into how to work with booksellers, not just sell to them.
Katie Mitchell, owner and general factotum at the Trope Bookshop, is new at all things bookstore related. Her road to bookstore ownership has been a twisty-turny one. As a kid she loved to read but, as so often happens, college and all its “offerings” left little time for to read for fun. Jump to 2020, that post-college pandemic thing, and she fell back in love with reading. In 2023 she left her corporate logistics job to pursue a newly formed idea: Romance Books...on wheels … and her first-born store was created. Affectionately known as Green Girl, her bookstore on wheels popped up everywhere in the Queen City: markets, book fairs, wine bars, and breweries! Late last year she decided that the bus was just too small and the smut readers of CLT needed more! In March she launched her first brick-and-mortar location in Plaza Midwood.
Learn more on Instagram @tropebookshop.
Sally Brewster is the longtime owner of Park Road Books in the Park Road Shopping Center, Charlotte’s beloved, full-service independent bookstore. With 38 years of experience in the publishing industry, she began her career as an independent sales representative for Random House and concluded it working with independent distributors. In 1999, John Barringer, owner of Little Professor Book Center (now Park Road Books), asked her to buy his bookstore. Initially, she thought anyone purchasing a bookstore then would be crazy due to fierce competition, so she agreed to run the store until a buyer was found. Ultimately, she became that “crazy” buyer and has since been mostly blissfully happy selling books at Park Road Shopping Center. While the team cross-trains at Park Road Books, she handles the bulk of book buying and manages all other tasks, including scrubbing the bathroom.
Learn more at https://parkroadbooks.com/