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The following article introduces a company called Book Are Fun and a broker that represents small publishers. Authors might want to look into the types of books BAF has distributed, research the cost to test books and see if BAF is a channel for their books.

Selling Books By The Truckload!
by Tim McCormick, Greentree Publishing 

Has anyone told you that you can sell books by the truckload? There are some books that have such mass appeal. Selling books in big quantities has put more than one publisher on the map. One company that buys books by the truckload was called Reading's Fun when it was first formed in 1990 and shortly after their name was changed to Books Are Fun. Reader's Digest acquired the company on October 1, 1999.

Books Are Fun (BAF) has eight different programs that combined generate over $250 million dollars in revenue each year. The two most established programs are their School Program and their Corporate Book Fair Program where they sell books directly to the public at 40% to 80% discount. Here is a little insight to these two programs.

Corporate Book Fair Program - 1 to 3 day events held at large corporations, high-rise office buildings and hospitals once or twice a year, offering a selection of hundreds of different titles to employees and visitors.

School Program - Displays of 25 - 30 different books and gifts are placed in the faculty lounges and media centers of schools every six weeks. Teachers and staff members can order the books for their own personal use and enjoyment. Orders are generally filled the following week.

Personal Experience

Seven years ago, I went to work for Reading's Fun as a corporate Book Fair rep in Arizona. I was going through a truckload of books (up to 15,000 books) every 3 to 4 weeks. I had the same two challenges that the company had: keeping the books that sold well in stock and finding new books to sell. I sold over 500,000 books in 3 years and learned a lot about their process of purchasing books from publishers and even more about what books the customer wanted to buy.

Through that process I found books from small to medium size publishers and tested the books. If the books did well I sent them to the home office and provided them with my results and feedback. About half of the books that I forwarded to them ended up being tested. About half of the books they tested ended up being production titles or were "rolled out".

To this day, I continue to function as a scout for books for Books Are Fun. I currently work as a broker for several small to medium size publishers representing their books to BAF and other special markets. Over the last seven years I have helped numerous publishers through the process of presenting books and the negotiation process for orders between 25,000 and 250,000 books.

What kind of books do they buy?

They look for hardcover books with a $20 or more retail price with hardcover illustrated children's books ($15 and up) being the exception. They will occasionally buy paperback books if they are part of a set. They look for general interest, self help, adult gifts, how-to, reference, sports, coffee table books, some best sellers, lots of cookbooks and their largest area of specialty is children's books (interactive, educational and storybooks).