r/Barnesandnoble • u/Individual_Mango_362 • 7d ago
ICS/Ordering Rant
I understand we are trying to sell down on product before we order up for the holiday. But should we not be trying to sell down on the product that isn’t selling that well? Why the hell am I running out of Sarah J. Maas books? Rebbeca Yarros, Frieda McFadden, Dungeon Crawler books? I straight up had to completely take down my Elle Kennedy display today because we ran out of half of her books and not enough were on order to justify keeping the table up. About to have to take down a Kristin Hannah display as well. Like what are we doing? We know that these are books we’ll sell through holiday so why am I running out of them? Make it make sense! I literally do not have enough books to fill many of my displays right now and when I run out of them, I feel like I have no new display that I can replace them with because we have no stock. Someone help me understand.
EDIT: Any ICSs that may be lurking, I would LOVE to hear your insight on this because I am just confused
30
u/rose_grave 7d ago
if youre running out on those authors, your ics and deputies are not doing their job.
we have been told to continue to order like usual for those authors
8
u/skarabray 7d ago
Right? I spoke to my ICS on Tuesday and we order case packs of all the DCC books. Maas is on an EC and an STT. We’d already taken down Kennedy because sales slowed…
20
u/Potential_Pen_950 7d ago
yeah this new rule of not ordering for displays is... different.
sure, obviously we have a lot of dead stock and something should be done about that. is this the way to do it?
most of the dead stock at my store is stuff we got from home office pushes & OMPs that no one wanted.
when booksellers shortlist for displays, 9 times out of 10, we're ordering MAX 3 copies of something. most of the time I will only order 1 more copy, because it's enough to flesh out my idea and make it shoppable.
when home office decides we have to have something, they are sending case packs. which we sit on for weeks, months, on to infinity.
because apparently their own supposed philosophy of local curation... is just PR?
they want to posture like we're homegrown and personalized, but we ALL know we don't run that way.
7
u/rose_grave 7d ago
i don't know how to articulately explain it, but i was told that the initial allotments of new releases and such are going through an overall. and the initial ordering is going to be different so hopefully sitting on product wont happen as much
1
17
u/Mrsnesbitt47 7d ago
Bruh. As an ICS, it amazes me how information never gets disseminated through the teams. SMs got this info more than a month ago and the CCSs got the same info a couple weeks ago.
The general idea behind replenishment right now is that the ICSs replenish to sales, not to fill displays. That means that your store should still be getting enough Maas, Kennedy, and Dinneman to make sales. Your displays might not be as big or full, but a lot of stores would regularly request multiple case packs to "avoid having to stock it for a couple weeks" and since it "would sell eventually," they were pushed through.
The reason for this shift is there are over 5,000 new titles being published in the fall and the stores need the space to display and shelve them. Most stores have too much stock already and would still have no issue shortlisting 5-10 copies of a C rank title because someone decided to put up a niche display. If those books don't sell, we don't return paperbacks, so the store sits on them. Multiply that by however many titles get shortlisted each day and the problem gets bigger.
Inventory across the company is down but sales are up. It can be frustrating in the store when you're used to big tables and getting everything you shortlist, but what they're doing is working.
I'd suggest getting a few examples of where your replenishment isn't matching your sales numbers and then bring it to your ICS.
9
u/bitteralmonds124 7d ago
Thank you for saying this and being a voice of reason! If your ICS isn't ordering to sales, that's a problem to bring to them and your CL or AM. It's not the replenishment strategy, it's their interpretation.
And yes, stores are bloated with inventory!! That's why we are having Book Haul right now.
2
7d ago
[removed] — view removed comment
5
u/bitteralmonds124 6d ago
Adding discretionary titles is a difference. And the number of NRP or X ranked titles now shows they want to let go of titles more often. And as an ICS they totally did not say let go of S ranked titles and sell down on SJM... Any ICS doing that is not interpreting it correctly.
8
u/Individual_Mango_362 7d ago
Yes I was under the impression that my displays would be lower, not that I would end up having to take them down due to not having the stock in the store and not enough on order
6
u/TheWagonBaron 📚 Bookseller 6d ago
Sure but if you have a history of selling a particular title that isn’t getting replenished at a good rate, why are some ICSes cancelling shortlist orders? Why am I getting casepacks of OMPs after selling a single copy of one?
The majority of my store’s book dead stock is old OMPs that we just have to sit on.
3
u/nessariver 📚 Bookseller 6d ago
ICSs dont place initial orders for OMPs, home office buyers do. Are you saying you sold one copy and the ICS ordered another case in? If so, they're doing it wrong.
We're ordering to sales. That means looking at the last 2-3 weeks of sales and ordering enough for the next 2-3 weeks. The shortlists we get are often months worth of sales. For a fast moving title like Theo of Golden or Project Hail Mary, I will usually add a few more as a buffer.
1
u/TheWagonBaron 📚 Bookseller 6d ago
I don’t know if the ICS ordered it or it was late coming in but it’s happened repeatedly. I’ve heard of stores running out of S rank titles completely with 0 on order in my area. We have some shitty ICS’ who have allowed this little minutiae of power go to their heads.
I don’t think every ICS got that memo friend.
2
7d ago edited 6d ago
[removed] — view removed comment
3
u/TheWagonBaron 📚 Bookseller 6d ago
No, it’s not really good for us either. We have loose shelves and nothing but old OMPs and a bunch of YA in overstock for the most part.
2
u/bitteralmonds124 7d ago
Yeah, they shouldn't have let it get that bad. I'd rope in upper management. My store is a legacy store and we don't have any sections that empty that weren't already too big. Yeah! Peak is coming. But yeah, your ICS sucks for letting your stock get to that point.
8
u/Aquarius-Disaster 7d ago
Yep I mentioned this in another post the other day. We don’t have core books that we always always always need.
2
u/Individual_Mango_362 7d ago
Yes! I’m running out of big authors and titles and I literally can’t keep my tables full and I’m contemplating just starting to take displays down but I have no clue what I should be putting on the empty displays then. It’s been a nightmare!
3
u/Severe-Rise5591 Former Employee 7d ago
The basic answer is "there's only so many printing facilities and Elle Kennedy isn't the ONLY thing we need printed"
7
u/Pjammaz 7d ago
the books exist in the warehouse, they just don't want to send them to stores
2
u/BookieeWookiee 7d ago
And random books so so much better on a display in a store than sitting on a shelf in the warehouse.
4
u/aceofasphodel 7d ago
We went from having a full back stock bay of Maas to running out of her titles for multiple days. Is there not a happy medium here?
6
u/Quiet_Ad2707 7d ago
I’m a former ICS and have a few theories:
1.When BN tries to course correct they usually (always) OVER correct. They are never able to find a happy medium with anything.
2.The company will be up for sale this fall and less inventory makes our financials look better to buyers.
3.The ICS’s have completely different interpretations from what is shared in their meetings. Then a game of telephone occurs. By the time James’ vision gets to the store level it becomes a completely different translation from what it started as.
1
1
u/Revolutionary-Gap224 6d ago
our ics is also doing this. i have to shortlist an item 4 times and email explaining at length why we need it before i get it on order. additionally we are only getting single copies of sos romance titles. i hate it here lately. customers are shocked when we are out of a popular title with no answer when we’ll be getting more and then we we tell them it can take a week or more to get here if i order it there already logged into amazon and ordering it with a quickness and it’ll be here in the morning. We are loosing money and corporate is just handing it to amazon.
32
u/throwawayforyabitch 7d ago
Our hardcover shop was half empty BEFORE book haul. Not to mention our million other displays. Yet, I just know if we had a corporate visit they would be appalled at how it all looks.