ABFFE and Ingram Introduce “Banned Books Week in a Box”

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In an effort to make it easy for booksellers to celebrate Banned Books Week –– which takes place from September 22 to 28 this year –– The American Booksellers Foundation for Free Expression (ABFFE) today announced a collaboration with Ingram Content Group.

As a result of this partnership, booksellers can order titles with additional discounts through Ingram from a list of more than 120 titles assembled by ABFFE. For the first 150 qualifying orders, Ingram will also deliver a promotional kit on behalf of the ABFFE that contains everything a bookseller would need to assemble a Banned Books Week display, including 200 bookmarks, 30 buttons, 10 bumper stickers, 30-feet of caution tape, and one of ABFFE’s popular Freadom T-shirts.

“The idea of Banned Books Week in a Box is to make it as easy as possible for booksellers to promote the freedom to read,” ABFFE President Chris Finan said. “We are very grateful for Ingram’s support. We couldn’t do it without them.”

Shawn Everson, chief commercial officer of Ingram added, “We are pleased to support the ABFFE in their efforts to make more books available to more readers nationwide. I look forward to our work together.”

For more information about the promotion with Ingram, booksellers can e-mail [email protected] or contact their Ingram sales representative or Ingram Customer Care at 1-800-937-8000.

Finan also thanked Above the Treeline for posting ABFFE’s new list of over 120 banned and challenged titles on Edelweiss, making it possible to search the list by author, title, and publisher. This list can also be used by booksellers to easily create Banned Books Week displays by featuring titles that are already on their shelves. Booksellers who subscribe to Treeline Analytics can determine how many of the books they have in stock and how well they are selling.

Again this year, Banned Books Week will include a virtual read-out of banned and challenged titles. Booksellers have participated in the virtual read-out by uploading videos of their customers and authors reading short excerpts of their favorite books. The videos appear on the Banned Books Week website. Detailed instructions for booksellers are available on the Banned Books Week section of the ABFFE website.

The ABFFE website also features a Banned Books Week Handbook, which includes many suggestions for easy and inexpensive ways to participate, including free posters available for download. More Banned Books Week resources are provided by The American Library Association.

ABFFE’s promotional products are currently on sale, including Freadom T-shirts, which have been marked down, and an additional discount has been applied to orders of 10 or more shirts.