Book and Author Submissions
Please read if you are hoping for our bookshop to stock your book
Firstly, we want to say congratulations on your book! Writing a book is no easy feat and we recognise a lot of work and passion goes into creating yours.
We enjoy hearing about local authors and their successes, however would advise that a bookshop we are presented with over 180,000 books published in the UK each year through traditional publishers. In addition, we are also approached numerous times each day by self-published and independent authors who also ask us to stock their books.
As you can imagine with our restricted shelf space, our stock collection is carefully curated with our extensive bookselling and publishing experience, to reflect the interest of our customers with the very best quality of books that are available. Therefore, we are afraid that we are unable to stock most of the books that we are presented with.
A helpful guide has been produced by The Booksellers Association and endorsed by the Society of Authors, which we would recommend you read carefully as it will provide invaluable advice about what a bookshop will need to help them decide to stock your book.
If we do decide not to stock your book, please do not take this as a personal rejection. Every bookshop and customer community is different and what may not work for one bookshop, may work in another.
Traditionally Published Books
If your book has been published by a mainstream publisher, we may already be aware of it. Send us an email with your ISBN details and we will take a look to see if it is something we can stock in our shop. With mainstream publishers we should already have accounts with their distributors to obtain copies and manage supply directly with them.
Self-Published Books
We define self-published books as those where the author has financed the publication or text at their own cost (including where the author has sourced funding elsewhere), without involvement from an established or mainstream publisher. This includes authors who use print companies who offer complete book publishing services, hybrid self-publishing and Print On Demand services such as Lulu.
If you are requesting for us to stock your book, please read the Booksellers Association guide and the below guidance.
Before approaching us, take time to consider the following.
Is your book of a good quality, both in contents (has an editor been involved) and print, paper and binding?
Is your book at a reasonable price point? We would expect to add an appropriate mark up to the trade price, would your book still be at a price comparable with similar books?
What are your trade terms? We would expect to stock books on a sale or return basis. It is worth carrying out research to check that you can provide suitable trade terms.
How will you market your book? You will need to actively promote your book to encourage visitors to the shop to purchase your book.
If you feel that considering the above, your book would be appropriate for our bookshop, please take the following steps.
- Please do not drop in with your book or post a copy unless we have specifically requested for you to do so. We do not accept submissions in person, by phone or in the post. We do not have a large team of booksellers and our time in the shop is focused on ensuring our customers have the best advice and shopping experience. Therefore, we ask this to enable us to be fair to all and give submissions the time and consideration that they need. If books are sent in the post without agreement we will not be able to review them and will not be able to return them or keep them in store for your collection due to limited space.
- Email us at thebooknutswf@gmail.com with the subject line ‘Author Submission’. In the email we would like to see the Title, ISBN, cover image, format and Publisher details. Underneath, provide the synopsis and author Bio. We would also request details of the trade price and RRP.
- I am afraid that we do not stock books published via Amazon due to trading terms and quality of production.
- If we would like to see a copy of your book, we will reply to you within one month. We will then aim to come back to you within 2 months with our decision regarding stocking your book. We are unable to provide individual feedback on submitted books due to the volume received and may take longer to consider your book during busy periods, such as holidays.
- If we do accept your book for stock, we will start with 1 copy initially for a trial period of 3 months. After 3 months we will review sales and decide whether the book will continue to be stocked. All books, even popular traditionally published books, have a shelf-life when they will no longer be stocked as we allow space for newer books.
If we do decide not to stock your book, please do not take this as a personal rejection. There are so many factors to consider, we are not able to provide personal feedback as to why it may not be the right fit. All we can advise is that every bookshop and customer community is different and what may not work for one bookshop, may work in another.
We wish you the best of luck with your book.