Promotional Graphics
Brazos (Baker) – How we treat people with disabilities
Beautiful covers; imit. leather this time, not hardcover; good price
This is included as an example of how you can assemble a graphic quickly for Instagram or Facebook or Pinterest using your own store’s BookManager page.
This image has an interesting backstory. It’s actually from the Parasource website. And it’s a Harvest House title. I knew they were selling their own lines, plus HarperCollins, but this was a surprise. As long as they keep stealing sales from my store, I don’t mind borrowing a graphic image or two from them. Harvest House doesn’t produce graphics.
InterVarsity – children’s tie-in with Prayers in the Night by Tish Harrison Warren
Publisher’s Weekly Tracks 25 Years of Christian Publishing
In conjunction with its 150th anniversary, Publisher’s Weekly, the industry’s leading trade magazine has published a series of articles which look at various genres in bookselling. Veteran writer Cathy Lynn Grossman looked at religious publishing, mostly emphasizing the growth and present state of Christian bookselling.
As the article begins, it notes the growth of religious publishing overall:
…Religion publishing was valued at $1.2 billion in 2020, the most recent annual estimate in the StatShot Annual Report from the Association of American Publishers. It’s a tally combining sales from religion presses and religion books from other sources. …this reflects a revenue increase of 10.8% for religion presses between 2016 and 2020, and an increase of units by 7.4%, reaching 179 million units…
But of course we also know the downside:
…In 1983, PW reported that 3,290 bookstores and 605 publishers and suppliers expected to do a billion dollars in business at a 9,000-person CBA [Christian Bookseller’s Association] show that year. By 2005 the organization was down to 2,256 members, and in 2016, membership was half that. The CBA finally shuttered in 2019 following longtime president Curtis Riskey’s departure and an entrepreneur’s takeover the year before.
There are fewer than 1,000 Christian bookstores today, including Catholic and church bookshops nationwide, according to the Noble Group, which provides outside sales representation to vendors in Christian retail. Williamson points out, “At one time, as much as 80% of Christian books, which are a majority of all religion book sales, moved through Christian retailers. Today, no more than 20% of Christian books are sold by that channel…”
I would encourage you to read the entire article, and if you have any staff in your store who are relatively new encourage them to check out the piece as well.
► To continue reading, click this link.
Christian Booksellers Market Books and Promote Doctrines
“With the purchase of as few as twelve copies, you get an extra 8% discount, a poster for your store window, an in-store shelf-header and an extra copy for you or your staff or for a giveaway. Plus, all copies are returnable after nine months.”
Sounds like a great deal doesn’t it?
You can just hear bookstore owners, or maybe yourself, saying, “Okay, I’ll take twelve copies.”
But I haven’t told you what the book is, have I?
If it’s an end-times book, which eschatological model does the author follow? If it’s a book on marriage, where do the authors stand on the role of women in the church and home? If it’s about engaging the culture, does the author envision Christians being active in the public square, or distancing ourselves because we are citizens of another kingdom? If it’s about the first handful of chapters in Genesis, does the writer take it literally or see it as allegorical?
Meanwhile, the books arrive and the copies, with their in-store shelf header and window cling are given store space front and centre. Face it, retailer, you are now endorsing this book and in so doing, you are promoting its viewpoint or core doctrine.
And in giving it that front-of-store end-cap, it means that other books aren’t appearing as prominently. The marketing materials and extra discount assured that the title received prime real estate.

I had to find an image for this article that didn’t reflect any particular titles we carry, hence this one, found on Reddit.
So who do you want to promote?
We have enough reasons right now to curtail visibility of certain authors, so I don’t need to give you more. We also don’t want to completely censor every viewpoint on marriage, the book of Revelation, immigration, and gun control which disagrees with our own. We want there to be room for pacifists and just-war theorists alike. As booksellers, we should want to create room for discussion.
We also don’t want to automatically be suspicious of extra discounts. Honestly, my store survives on extra margin points and/or free shipping.
But we don’t want to be investing our money in things with which we passionately disagree. We might have a few authors we don’t like, but we would rather place them on a lower shelf past the store’s halfway mark than to give them the coveted end-cap when customers walk in the door.
We also don’t have the time spend on hours of research. Ultimately, we have to trust the doorkeepers of major Christian brands — Baker, Tyndale, D.C. Cook, Harvest, etc. — to do what’s right.
However, I think we need to know what we’re promoting, and we need to know that by giving certain titles and authors prime space, we are in fact promoting viewpoints which will affect the spiritual formation of our customers.
We also need to recognize that the vibe our store gives off is noted by customers in ways we can’t imagine, and that each product choice reflects the spiritual atmosphere which shoppers perceive.
We’re advocating for theological positions whether we like it or not, and while we’re not all theologians, scholars or academics; we need to endeavour to make the best choices we can.
This article was written in a relative vacuum, and does not reflect any particular current promotions on offer of which I’m not aware.
Graphics for Social Media, Newsletters
There’s 2 versions of this one. I originally wanted to just feature Divinity Boutique, but I realized there are still one or two people left for whom the Dayspring name means something.
Backlist (generic) graphics; I like to pick “random” products to feature in our newsletters:
The next one has an interesting story…
…this is a great little board book based on a classic Old Testament scripture, but the one minute video was uploaded to YouTube in such a way that it had no preview thumbnail, so we had to create one and add it manually. $13.50 retail; flip book.
That’s not the only time you have to create graphics from scratch…
…and I wanted to promote the little 8-packs of notes from Dayspring and couldn’t believe there wasn’t a decent image online of the assortment or part of it. I had 2 minutes to come up with this one!
This next one isn’t coming out until May:
This last one is my store’s Facebook header. If you look really closely you might be able to tell it’s set up in a way I can simply drop new titles on top of old ones, but you have to make the overlap work logically. You’re welcome to steal the idea and drop in your own titles. Our store selection may be too progressive for some!
If you have graphics you’d like to share, feel free to send them (searchlight [at] nexicom [dot] net) or just send us a note that stores are welcome to use things on your FB page carte blanche.
If you’re simply hunting online for things, remember that even though A-zon has people full time creating promotional images for Christian books, I would advise against borrowing them. Check out publishers’ and individual authors’ sites and social media.
Also, re. Nana the Great… above; this one turned out to be “spiritually lite” and is better suited to mainstream bookstores; but there is at least one page which mentions prayer, though apparently Nana dances when she prays!
HarperCollins Announces New Order Minimums
After looming for several months, HarperCollins released its new shipping minimums this morning. Some smaller stores are not going to like what they see, other stores are simply not going to understand it fully.
First, some background.
On the logistics/shipping end of things, the company has been bleeding tremendous amounts of money for years. Consider what happens when XYZ Christian Books places an order for 3 each of 6 titles:
- one title ships normally
- one is print-on-demand and ships separately
- one is “monitored stock” and ships separately again
- one is a “Love Inspired” title and ships separately
- one is currently in reprint and ships later, often by itself
- one is not yet released, and ships later, often on its own
Each one of these generates a separate shipping carton. Often these are double-reinforced (more expensive) and non-reusable boxes.
Each one generates a separate invoice, most of which are then mailed separately at a cost of $1.30 US per mailing, not including printing the invoice and the cost of the envelope.
Each shipment takes 16-22 to reach stores in Ontario, where I’m writing from, and possibly longer for the West Coast or Maritime provinces.
It’s a mess, and our example was generous, assuming 3 copies per title. Many times these shipments are ones and twos, and that often leaves them subject to damage in shipping.
So today, after keeping us waiting for several months, the company announcement is this:
Effective April 4th, 2022, orders must meet the order minimum of 20 units to qualify for free freight.
Orders that do not meet the minimum will be processed with freight added at invoicing. Titles ordered that are coded OP or NOP (not our publication) do not count towards the 20 unit minimum.
HarperCollins will not combine new orders with existing backorders to meet minimum.
The fun news continues on a FAQ sheet which was combined with the mail announcement. Here’s just a few:
Q: If a PO is short of the 20 units minimum will the customer be notified prior to shipping that the order did not qualify for free freight?
A: No, it is up to the customer to ensure that their order meets the minimum.Q: Are we able to quote freight charges to accounts when they have orders that don’t meet the minimum?
A: Yes, if someone calls customer service to ask for this information, an estimate can be provided.Q: If an order meets minimum but contains titles that are in different warehouses, will each shipment be charged freight?
A: No, if the order meets the minimum, it will ship free freight regardless of which warehouse it ships from.
The treatment of NYP titles is a bit of a mystery. It’s been suggested to me that an account simply wait for the book to be available and order then, but remember, shipping times with Harper are running anywhere from 16-22 days here in Ontario.
There was no indication on the announcement if this essentially means the scrapping of designated ship days.
Here was my reply to our sales rep:
This is a completely one-sided document.
It basically contains a number of things accounts are expected to do for you, but absolutely nothing of what you’re prepared to do for us.
There’s no indication as to how this solves the chronic problems of the last two years; how it streamlines the process.
It also places a huge administrative burden on the purchaser for each store vis-a-vis backorder management.
What are your thoughts? I’ve opened a discussion thread at Canadian Christian Retail Insights or you can leave a comment here.
HarperCollins’ “The Hub” Website Packed with Conflicting Information
Yesterday we had requests for two older novels not in stock. One by Brandilyn Collins and the other by Ted Dekker. With each, the initial look up states that the titles are not available, and then, clicking on the same ISBN for further information, it says the opposite, that they are available.
Example 1:
So what would you do? Would you tell your customer that the books are available or that they are not available? Past experience tells us you can’t simply place the order, because even the order confirmation is worthless.
Tyndale University and Seminary Bookstore Closing
Students and staff at Tyndale University and Tyndale Seminary in Toronto received notice on Wednesday (3/16) that their campus bookstore is closing.
As has been the case with many Christian bookstores, Tyndale has experienced challenges generating sufficient revenue to cover its expenses. Sales have been trending downward for several years, as a result of competition from megabrands such as Amazon and lower demand for Christian resources. Consequently, it is no longer economically feasible to continue to operate the Campus Store on our own. Cabinet has made the decision to close the store.
Effective July 1, 2022 these services are going to be outsourced to Cornerstone Bookshop. Located just 10 minutes away at 89 Finch Ave. W., Cornerstone Bookshop is an established Christian bookstore that has the ability to also serve the Tyndale community.
However, the notion that Cornerstone is “10 minutes away” is optimistic, even for people with vehicles available. Without private transportation, it’s a ten minute bus ride, followed by a transfer to the subway for a five minute ride (if there are no delays) followed by a five minute walk.
The letter continues,
By transitioning these services to a partner who is successful on their own, and who will be strengthened further by adding Tyndale’s customer base, both Tyndale and Cornerstone Bookshop will benefit by this change.
The Tyndale community will be able to shop in their store or place orders online and have items drop shipped to Tyndale at no additional cost. Cornerstone will have a dedicated webpage for textbooks beginning with the Fall 2022 semester. Information regarding how to order textbooks and other items, such as Tyndale-branded merchandise, will be sent to you at a later time.
Back in October, 2021, we shared with you how Redeemer University in Hamilton was moving in the opposite direction; renovating and re-branding their store. You can read that article, with a picture of the striking new exterior, by clicking here.
We first profiled Cornerstone back in 2013. Altogether, they’ve been open for about 16 years. The store packs a lot of merchandise into a small space, and there is an excellent overview in the header photo on their website landing page.
The textbook market is quite different from the trade book market. Between considerably higher list prices and shorter — often much shorter — discounts, stores which are conscious of their bottom line and ROI would not want to tip the scales too far in the direction of servicing this market. And unsold inventory can be most unforgiving if you have stock of the third edition of a book like How to Read the Bible for All Its Worth and professors are demanding that students work from the fourth edition, or if a professor updates their textbook list for a popular course altogether.
One would hope that students picking up texts would browse the store and perhaps pick up some regular merchandise as gifts for friends and family, but if the plan is to provide a drop-service to the school, that type of browsing won’t happen.
The other thing a store — any store — needs to watch when getting involved in textbook sales is that it involves dealing with a host of suppliers — U. of T. Press Distribution and Wiley come to mind — that many Christian bookstores are able to comfortably live without using. Increasingly some, such as Oxford University Press, are charging freight costs on shipments which were previously exempt, and the marginal cost of shipping increases with smaller orders. If there are 40 students in the class, how many copies can be assumed to be purchased through a college or university’s own textbook outlet? Additionally, how long do you keep some students waiting to see if any further orders develop?
Textbook buying is both an art and a science, something that stores like the bookstore at Regent College in Vancouver have had years of experience learning; and Tyndale possessed that knowledge as well. Hopefully the entirety of Tyndale’s expertise can be passed on to the new textbook stewards at Cornerstone.
Photos: Tyndale University, Cornerstone file photo
Herald Press Removes Titles by Bruxy Cavey
It’s been a week since we first learned of a situation which has rocked some quarters of Evangelicalism in Canada, but as of today (3/14) it is now a publishing-related story which we will share with Canadian bookstore owners and managers here. Four titles (two primary books and two related study guides) are affected.
Click the header which follows to read the press release at its source.
Herald Press pulls Bruxy Cavey books
HARRISONBURG, VA — Herald Press will no longer be selling books by well-known author Bruxy Cavey, effective immediately. Cavey, author of Herald Press titles Reunion and The End of Religion, was asked to resign from his role as senior pastor at The Meeting House after the church received the results of a third-party investigation into sexual misconduct allegations against him. After submitting his resignation, Cavey publicly confessed to having a longstanding extramarital affair. The Meeting House has named this relationship as an abuse of power and authority.
“We take our responsibility of resourcing the church seriously,” said Amy Gingerich, Herald Press publisher. “Like The Meeting House, we at MennoMedia also stand against sexual misconduct, sexual harassment, and the abuse of power and authority. Given that The Meeting House asked Cavey to resign and removed all his teaching videos from their website and the Be In Christ denomination revoked his credentials for ministry, we at Herald Press cannot in good faith sell his books.”
Cavey’s books may continue to be available through retailers who have existing inventory, but Herald Press will no longer publish, print, or distribute Cavey’s titles…
More background is available at Kate Shellnutt’s article at Christianity Today.
HarperCollins Christian Publishing: Is Logistical Chaos God’s Judgement?
OPINION
This is an opinion piece and should not be treated as a news item.
It’s easy to fall into the dichotomy that church is church and business is business, and that, while the content of the books Christians publish is definitely related to understanding and applying the ways of God, the business practices should not be over-spiritualized.
But lately, I’ve listened to a couple of podcasts from journalist Julie Roys and wondered if I can connect some dots. First, let’s look at the problems that we, as Canadian stores are facing getting resources from HarperCollins Christian Publishing.
- A single order can result in four different types of shipments with each one having a separate invoice generated and mailed separately, resulting in
• an onslaught of mail, each invoice bearing a $1.30 US cost, plus printing; creating another statement line item
• individual shipping costs and packaging costs; this in an age where “green” consciousness is constantly rising - long delays getting books back on press, sometimes six months
- useless, one-time corrugated shipping cartons, which need to be recycled immediately after opening and thereby can’t be used to re-ship/deliver larger product orders to customers; again, strange in a world where “green” awareness is so important
- insistence that “monitored” or “golden” bestseller product be released manually, sometimes resulting in a delay of an extra week; incongruous considering that these are bestsellers
- insistence that orders as small as one or two copies of “monitored” stock not be released with small orders
- invoices bearing what are sometimes retail prices, and sometimes are net prices
- a website option which promises “invoices and statements” but is incapable of showing account statements
- statements which cut off early in the month, only to re-classify invoices from the 27th to 31st of the month as overdue in subsequent statements
- website product listings which do not immediately indicate the difference between a key product and its study guide, or a key product and its Spanish equivalent
- invoices and packing slips sent with shipments which are for other stores in Canada and the U.S.; or there is simply no paperwork
So is all this simply, as they would have you believe, a result of staff-shortages, bad weather and a worldwide pandemic?
This is where it gets spiritual. Is God withholding his hand of blessing from Zondervan and Thomas Nelson? I’m sure they would disagree and would have us know that everything is moving up and to the right. Which of course, with the recent tidal wave of price increases, it would be.
This morning I looked again at the Tower of Babel narrative in Genesis 11:
NIV.Gen.11.5 But the Lord came down to see the city and the tower the people were building. 6 The Lord said, “If as one people speaking the same language they have begun to do this, then nothing they plan to do will be impossible for them. 7 Come, let us go down and confuse their language so they will not understand each other.” 8a So the Lord scattered them from there over all the earth…
Maybe that’s an unusual case in terms of God’s dealings with us. Perhaps a better analogy is God simply allowing Israel to wander for 40 years for what, as Deuteronomy 1:2 tells us, could have been an eleven-day journey.
What might call God to withhold his blessing, or, as above, do more? This is where the Julie Roys podcast fits in. I want to suggest you listen two specifically,
- March, 2021 – What’s the Truth about John MacArthur?
- March, 2022 – Victim of Plagiarism by Christine Caine Speaks Out
These are but two of many examples of situations where HCCP stands “weighed in the balances and found wanting.” In the case of Carey Scott whose content was plagiarized by Christine Caine, there was a settlement of a lawsuit in 2018, but there has never been a formal apology from Caine or the publisher. Dennis Swanson’s print acknowledgement of writing/editing material for John MacArthur was removed and for over a year, the publisher simply keeps saying “we’re still looking into it.”
Consider also the HCCP authors whose brand was damaged in 2020. We listed many of them in this article. Ravi Zacharias, Eric Metaxas, Dave Ramsay, John Ortberg, Franklin Graham, MacArthur, etc. were all high-profile authors with Nelson or Zondervan.
It’s important that we not think that because bookstore staff are “in the ministry” that our publishing partners, as with every human endeavour, are not free from corruption. If you’ve been associated with Christian publishing for any length of time, you probably have stories, too; some of which perhaps even I am not aware of.
But when problems are systemic over a prolonged period of time, you have to wonder if God is “confusing the movement” as he did at Babel; or simply withholding blessings which we normally experience everyday without realizing the degree to which God is orchestrating events to make “things work together for good;” and the times God “makes your paths straight.”
Graphic Traffic
I was unaware of this title; my HCCP focus being primarily on TNI and ZDV titles. Here’s the 4-1-1 on this:
During the last five years of his life, best-selling spiritual author Henri J. M. Nouwen became close to The Flying Rodleighs, a trapeze troupe in a traveling circus. Like Nouwen’s own life, a trapeze act is full of artistry, exhilarating successes, crushing failures and continual forgiveness. He wrote about his experience in a genre new to him: creative non-fiction. In Flying, Falling, Catching, Nouwen”s colleague and friend Carolyn Whitney-Brown presents his unpublished trapeze writings framed by the true story of his rescue through a hotel window by paramedics during his first heart attack.
Here are the rest of the current HTML elements I have on file:
Tyndale House gathered both of these title for this image.
Tyndale again. This isn’t new product, but I used it to highlight all six titles available in the Immerse series.
I really enjoyed watching the entire sermon series on which this book is based. Six messages at Southeast Christian Church in Kentucky.
Some authors are just plain fun to carry! To hear Brant’s radio show is to love him. Here’s another:
The book is ordered through Baker/Parasource.
C’mon, Worthy Books … a 50% markup on the American dollar? 7.99 US / 11.99 CDN. Probably cheaper if bought from Ingram.
If you move quickly, you can get a bunch of these Easter devotionals for free giveaway in your store, in exchange for your best ministry gift to Our Daily Bread Canada.
We made some changes in our own business strategy for 2022 to give more attention to valuable backlist. Both Canadian distributors have these, but be careful trading a lower MSRP for a shorter discount.
Another HarperOne title I missed. Excerpts from previous works. 400 pages; $37.99 CDN.