Carrying Your Book

at Pearl Street Books

Dear Author,

Congratulations on your new book! Thank you for your interest in partnering with Pearl Street Books. We are a small independent bookstore and we operate on a narrow margin. As such, we are unable to carry every book for which we receive requests. Still, we are happy to evaluate your book for inclusion in our inventory. Here's how that process works.

  1. Submit your info

    To be considered, you must submit a business card and a paper copy of your book to our store so that we can evaluate whether we can carry it. We cannot return this copy of the book. We will evaluate your book for: fit in the store, literary quality, shelf appeal, and readiness to market and promote. The most common reasons we don’t carry books are:

  • Author name/title not listed on the spine

  • Design and/or production standards don’t match our expectations for stock

  • Book doesn’t match curatorial needs

  • Book is published by Amazon or one of its affiliates

Please note that our buyer is not required to provide feedback on their decision. We receive many requests each month to review books and it is simply not feasible to provide individual feedback. We will notify you within two (2) weeks. If we accept your request, you will be provided with next steps.

A note on publishing through Amazon:

We understand why authors may choose Amazon and its affiliates to assist in publishing a book. However, we have taken a public stance against Amazon. We do not support Amazon companies because of the negative impact they have had on the book industry due to their predatory nature. This includes Createspace and all Amazon affiliates. If this is how you published your book, we will not be able to carry it at our store.

2. Stock your book

Option A - Consignment: If your book is selected to consign with us, we will offer you a 60/40 split (you keep 60% of any sales). We will carry your book for 12 months. We typically stock five (5) copies and you continue to own the books until sold. You are expected to pick-up any unsold books within 2 weeks of the ending of the 12 month consignment period. If your book has sold well, we may negotiate an additional 12 month period. To restock inventory or be paid out, an appointment is necessary. Appointments can be set up via info@pearlstbooks.com or via phone at 608-782-3424. This is to ensure that we have adequate time to inventory the book and prepare your payout payment.

Option B - Order from Ingram: If your book is selected to be stocked at our store and if it is available on Ingram (at regular discount), we will order your book directly from Ingram and promote it at our store.

3. Be a good partner

We ask that if we carry your book, you help promote your book sales by urging local people to buy at Pearl Street Books. We get very discouraged when we agree to support someone’s book, and then we see that person urging people in our community to buy their book through Amazon and not even mention us. We have even had authors ask us to distribute bookmarks advertising their books with a link to buy it on Amazon (no mention of our store). We want to support you and expect that you will also support us.

Please let us know if you have any questions by emailing info@pearlstbooks.com. Congrats again! We look forward to reading your book!

Cheers!

Beth Hartung

Owner of Pearl Street Books

About Author Events:

We love hosting author events! Unfortunately, we are unable to accommodate all requests to host in-store events. Our curated events schedule is determined based on pricing, demand, and the book’s built-in marketing potential. At events, we expect that the author will encourage people to purchase their book from us and NOT promote Amazon on promotional materials and while in our store. All event requests should be sent to our email at info@pearlstbooks.com.