Pub Talk is an interview series where we chat to some of Australia’s most experienced and influential publishers, editors and agents about the industry and the many pathways to publication for new writers.
In this instalment, we are widening the scope to draw wisdom from one of the country’s most esteemed booksellers. Fiona Stager OAM is co-owner of Avid Reader, Where the Wild Things Are and Riverbend Books in Brisbane.
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Could you tell us how you first got into bookselling? I understand that you started your career in second-hand books.
Yes, I did that through my twenties. I was part of a community group and it was a bookshop with a political focus. But West End was changing, the suburb was gentrifying around us, and I realised that there was a demand for new books in that area.
Was the change a learning curve?
Absolutely. I had no idea. I thought books were books. But it was a completely different business. Completely. I’d also been very inspired by Gleebooks in Sydney, so I knew when we started Avid Reader in 1997 that we would be very events-driven. We have a huge events program.
Images: @avidreader Instagram.
In an interview with The Bookseller’s Podcast, you said that your events ‘seem really relaxed, but, in fact, a lot of work goes on behind the scenes’. What do you think makes for a good event?
My big thing is that people feel welcome. That there’s a nice buzz, a nice party atmosphere. It’s very important to me that it starts on time and that it finishes on time. The other thing, of course, is that there are engaging authors and well-prepared presenters. We don’t really have dud events because we will work with authors beforehand, especially self-published authors. We always encourage them to come to an event before their own. And we’re always learning too, and then sharing that information.
(Laughs.) An event that makes people cry always sells more. That’s my secret tip: make the audience cry and buy more books.
Sometimes authors think that the bookshop will generate the crowd. Is Avid Reader able to do that?
We do have some people who will just come to everything. But no, we need authors to be inviting people and promoting their events on social media. The authors I have the biggest trouble getting an audience for are the ones that publicists talk me into. They’ll say, ‘Oh, but they’ve got, you know, 100,000 people on Instagram’. But often those people don’t even tell their followers that they’ve got an event, and that drives me absolutely bananas.
We need authors to be inviting people and promoting their events on social media.
Then there is the other kind of person, the local who invites every single person they know. And they all come, because, as I always advise, the authors invite people like it’s a party. I’ll be chatting to people, and I’ll ask, ‘How do you know the author?’ and they’ll say ‘Oh, they live down the street from me.’ We really rely on authors being able to bring a crowd, either by inviting all their friends and family directly, or telling their followers and fans on social media. We do the same, but we have so many events that our core group are not going to come to every single event.
What kind of events have the most trouble getting an audience?
We’ve struggled with some genres. Literary fiction was very hard for us at one stage if that person wasn’t a big name. So Krissy Kneen developed the salon program where emerging authors speak for no more than three minutes each as an opening act, and then we go into the conversation with the visiting author. And they’ve been hugely successful. Because three people each have friends who’ll come, and then our book clubs will come and then people who have read the author will come. So that’s how we start to build a critical mass.
I think people will be surprised that some of our events are quite small. But we give them the same amount of love and attention. They’re often the ones that I will come to, and they’re often the ones that I’ve enjoyed the most.
There’s great advice in there for writers who are starting out or away from their hometown. They should think about collaborating with other writers to maximise interest.
Yes, we really love getting authors together.
Images: @avidreader Instagram.
A common question booksellers get from authors is if they will stock their books. Do you have any advice for writers who want to see their work on bookshop shelves?
I think authors should engage and support us. You need to follow our social media, subscribe to our newsletters, go to our events. You need to really be engaged at that level.
It depends if they’re self-published or not. I think it’s important that authors know how much it costs to even get their book onto the shelves. Self-published authors have to be set up as a supplier. They have to go into two lots of databases—our point of sale and then into MYOB. They have to be received. With self-published authors, we often have to help them with the basics of how to do an invoice. Each one of those steps costs me money, because I’ve got somebody that I have to pay to do all those tasks.
It’s important that authors know how much it costs to even get their book onto the shelves.
When books are on our shelves it costs money. We look at sales per square metre, so every inch of shelf space costs money. We don’t just put a price sticker on the back of the book, and it goes on the shelf. That’s not how it operates. It’s a complex and sophisticated system, and there are lots of checks and balances all along the way.
Authors can have unrealistic expectations of booksellers. They put so much work into their books and often have high hopes.
I really understand people’s enthusiasm. I’ve always had authors on staff, so I know how hard they work and what is involved in that. But I think it would also be good for authors to understand what our businesses are like as well. I think it’s really great if we—bookshops, authors, publishers—all know more about each other’s side of the business.
Once authors do know, I find that they are then so much more respectful. Then, of course, we are much more prepared to engage with them.
Do you like impromptu author visits?
I like it if an author introduces themselves, especially if they’re new to the area. Or if they’re a new author, but I might just know them as a customer.
It would also be good for authors to understand what our businesses are like.
I think it’s good that they understand that we’re working and that customers are always a priority. That kind of basic kind of courtesy and politeness is really important. But I love it when they pop in to sign books. We’re often surprised at the authors who are around, living in Brisbane or just passing through. I’m often surprised when I find out they’ve come into the shop and I say: ‘Why didn’t you say hi?’ Sometimes they let us know by email or via a publicist beforehand. If they do that, then we’ll try to have the books on the counter and always try to do social media with them.
Images: @fionastager Instagram.
What role do you think booksellers play in the community?
A bookseller has to listen to their community, respect their community and respond to the community’s needs.
My community is very diverse. It has always been super smart, always engaged with issues and always ahead of me. They’re often ahead of publishers, they will know what books are coming out overseas and what’s happening. I owe them a lot.
Booktopia, the country’s biggest online book retailer, is currently under administration. It reminds me of what happened with REDgroup in 2011 with the closure of Borders and Angus & Robertson. Do you see similarities?
Yes. For us, it’s just that we never know what the next threat or challenge is going to be.
I think they’re both similar in that they probably share a very similar management style. That’s my diplomatic answer. (Laughs.) It’s hard to make money out of books, whatever size you are, and both companies seemed to get ahead of themselves. They both seemed to misread the market. Booktopia seemed to believe that the growth that a lot of us experienced during Covid was going to continue. I could be wrong, maybe they did have a contingency plan in place. But I don’t think any of us thought we would ever experience the sales growth that we did from the middle of 2020 through to the middle of last year. I think they were misguided in believing that this demand would keep going. They also seemed to get away from their core business a little bit, like getting into publishing.
The company was revealed to have large debts and publishers are also now worried that they’re not going to be getting as much buy-in for new releases. There already seem to be rippling effects throughout the industry.
There does. But Booktopia were our biggest competitors—I have to be aware of that. Not the other indies around us, not Dymocks, not even, in our case, Big W. We were losing a lot of business to Booktopia.
Do you think that the sales will just go to Amazon now, or are you hoping that people will turn towards their local bookshops?
Yeah, it does surprise me sometimes. If you follow any of the chat groups on social media, especially Facebook, you’ll see that readers seem surprised that independents have websites and that you can buy online from us.
It’s hard to make money out of books, whatever size you are.
That’s something that we need to take responsibility for. We’re not telling our customers that we’re working in that space. We’re not telling our customers that they can pre-order. So that’s a message that we need to actively get out. We can do all of the things that Booktopia was doing. And they weren’t really big into deep discounting. They would have specials and sales, but so do I.
Raymond Bonner, co-owner of Bookoccino, explored how the government could intervene in his Age article, ‘If you love discount books, you don’t love their authors’. Would you like to see the government do more to support bookshops and writers?
Yes, absolutely. What I would like is for bookshops to be able to access grants and sponsorship like publishers do. There are a lot of publishers who receive money from Creative Australia. I would really like us to have more support for events, newsletters…all the things that bookshops across Australia are doing to support local authors. It’d be great if we could do more in that space.
In the article, Richard Flanagan tells Bonner that ‘without independent bookshops there is effectively little market for Australian literature and no future for Australian writers’. Do you think that’s true?
Bookselling is an ecosystem. Like all ecosystems, we need everybody to be present for it to be healthy. We need small indies, large indies and I really see a role for franchises. We can’t forget the chain franchisees. They look just like me. They’ve got their business mortgaged against their homes. A lot of them are active in their local communities and work with local authors. The difference is that they have to give a percentage of their turnover to head office and indies don’t.
In terms of publishing, I think independents are vital to Australian publishers. They know that, I think. Especially in the last fifteen years, with the increase in readership for Australian books. But I still think that they don’t realise that it is a transactional relationship. We heard Nic Bottomley from the bookshop Mr B’s in the UK at the recent BookPeople conference. He really fired me up. He originally worked in finance, the big end of town. And he said booksellers need to stop saying ‘thank you for your support’ to publishers. We need to be saying, this is what we do. This is what you need to do. This is why you need to support us more. I think we take a lot of risk. I know too many booksellers who have lost their homes or are working at, for example, Bunnings now. And that makes me really sad because they were good booksellers and they had good businesses. But all it needs is a change in rent or a change of ownership of a building.
As a bookseller myself, I’ve seen how a bookshop can take an advance copy from an unknown and create an audience for it. Is that curation process underrated?
Yes, perhaps. The independent sector in Australia is much stronger than overseas. I think we hover around about twenty per cent of sales here, more than in the US and the UK. I think it’s good that readers and authors know that as well.
You’ve encountered many writers in your career. What qualities have you noticed in successful authors?
A good ability to work to deadlines. Which sounds obvious, but it’s often not the case. And a curiosity. If I think about the authors who we’ve employed across all genres, they’re curious. They were curious about customers and what they liked to read, rather than just their own tastes.
You’ve been involved with many writing prizes—for example, the Vogel, the Stella and the Walkleys. You’ve also championed them personally, helping to establish the Queensland Literary Awards when Campbell Newman cut the Premier’s Literary Awards. Why are they important?
It can be a vexing issue—I understand how distressing it can be if writers aren’t listed or don’t win. But I do believe that they are a way for us to get more media on particular titles that may not have had that exposure.
If I think about the authors who we’ve employed across all genres, they’re curious.
I think the prize money is very important to authors. I’d like to see it not taxed. All prize winnings are taxed, except for the Prime Minister’s Literary Awards. And I just think it would be such an easy thing to change, because it’s not a lot of money across the year, even if you take into consideration all of the literary prizes. It’s just not much for the government. I’m a big believer in paying tax. I’m not into tax avoidance at all. But I know for authors this might be the one year that they win a couple of prizes. And they may not have an income in two year’s time.
A big part of bookselling is forecasting trends. What’s hot right now?
I love thinking about what the next big thing is. It has been romance and now romantasy. I’ve never been a snob with my reading. I’m always happy to embrace new genres. So we’re going along on that ride. Philosophy is also our big thing at the moment. Stoicism has been big for a while. I’m also keen to do more midnight releases, I quite like that. We’re doing one for the new Sally Rooney.
For me, I’m also really trying to be a lot more backlist driven. And a lot of customers don’t care if a book came out just now, six months ago or two years ago if they’ve just learned about it. I get really excited by that.
The strategy makes business sense when you’re competing with a discount department store that may be selling a new release book at cost price. You’re also giving books a second lease of life outside the regular promotion cycles.
And a lot of those titles are still sitting in the publishers’ warehouses. It’s environmentally friendly for us to be selling those books.
In 2015, you opened the kids’ bookshop Where The Wild Things Are next to Avid. Why was it important for you to have a separate space for children’s literature?
In fact, I actually wanted a cookbooks and travel bookshop. (Laughs.) What we really needed was more space. Space to receive stock, hold event stock and just have more storage.
But when we ran the figures, we realised that children’s books were almost thirty per cent of our business. And this was just from a very small section of the shop, this tiny corner. At that time, there was a huge growth in Australian children’s authors and books. And the demand was there. So, we needed the space, but the bonus was the bookshop and it’s been a great joy.
You’ve recently been awarded an Order of Australia and an ABIA Hall of Fame: Lloyd O’Neil Award nod. How does it feel to be recognised in this way?
Very humbling. They were never awards that I thought I’d get. I literally cried when Paddy from the ABIA rang to tell me. You know how you think, Oh, I’ll never win that award. I hadn’t even thought that!
With the OAM, I still think that there are so many other people who are more deserving. Like the librarian Clare McCorry, who works at a very small and multicultural Catholic school in quite a disadvantaged area. She’s well past retirement age and she just works tirelessly to raise money for books for these kids. She’s the kind of person who should be getting recognition.
You recently expanded your business with the purchase of Riverbend Books in 2023. Does that mean that you’re optimistic about the future of the bookshop?
Yes, I am. I think what we learned from Covid was not just that the book was resilient, but bookshops were. People came to bookshops and they deliberately chose their local bookshop. There is a future.
This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.
