On Friday, February 19, booksellers can attend the first part of a financial planning series hosted by the American Booksellers Association’s PK Sindwani and Jennifer Almodovar.

The session, called “Q1 Check-in: Planning Today for a Successful 2021 [6],” will cover monitoring or creating a budget, responding to changing business conditions, managing cash flow, and monitoring important benchmarking data to track progress and meet yearly goals.

Additionally, attendees will have the chance to take part in a workshop where they will create a template for building their annual budget. Digital handouts will be available for booksellers to reference the week of the event.

“In order to make your bookstore more efficient and profitable, understanding your finances and planning accordingly is a must,” Sindwani told Bookselling This Week. “It is especially important during these tough times.”

Two additional parts of this series will take place after Winter Institute:

Thursday, February 25, at 3:00 p.m. ET: Bookkeeping 101

Accurate and timely bookkeeping is the foundation of a profitable business. This session will cover the fundamentals of bookkeeping, with a focus on the general ledger document, and explain how proper bookkeeping improves efficiency and, ultimately, saves time and money. In addition, attendees will get an overview of cash flow, income statements, and balance sheets.

Thursday, March 3, at 3:00 p.m. ET: Managerial Accounting

Designed for booksellers with some understanding of bookkeeping, this session will take a deeper dive into a store’s individual financial statements, focusing on how to read and apply the information in balance sheets, income statements, cash flow statements, and the ABACUS report in order to make sound financial decisions.

Watch Bookselling This Week for registration details for parts two and three.