Age guidance divides trade as first Christmas approaches
03.12.09 | Caroline Horn
Booksellers on both sides of the age guidance debate have expressed frustration at the introduction of age guidance on children's books. This will be the first Christmas in which the programme to include age guidance on the back of children's books has been embedded, following its launch last summer.
The decision by publishers to introduce age guidance followed research for the Publishers Association (PA) showing that parents and gift buyers found it difficult to select age-appropriate books for children. However, not all children's publishers have taken part in the scheme with companies including Walker Books, Usborne and Bloomsbury abstaining, as well as a number of authors.
This has limited its effectiveness said Rachel Airey, children's buyer for W H Smith. "Age guidance on book covers is useful, especially for gift buyers, but the initiative is not industry-wide. So many books don't have age guidance that consumers are not very aware of it and they aren't looking at the back cover for guidance."
She added: "The Christmas period would be an ideal time to have guidance available but to be useful, it would need to be consistent and it isn't."
Marilyn Brocklehurst of the Norfolk Children's Book Centre said that age guidance on covers had cost the bookshop sales in the past year. "It is a particular problem with school sales. If I say a book is good for Year 6 but the cover indicates age 9+, that overrides my recommendation and teachers won't take the book. I'm losing classroom sales of 60-plus copies."
Francesca Dow, who heads the PA's Children's Book Group working party on age guidance, said that around 75% to 80% of new titles published by participating companies now carry age guidance. She said: "There will be research into the impact of age guidance on sales but at this stage, we don't have the critical mass we need. Backlist titles are still being reprinted with age guidance, so we need more time."
Convincing evidence that the initiative has helped increase sales would encourage Walker Books to have further discussion on the issue, said publishing director Jane Winterbotham. However, she added: "I think we have yet to see that, so are not planning to implement the new age guidance at the moment."
Comments on this article
By Amanda Lees
Including age guidance on books does a great disservice to the group who should matter most - young readers. Already divided by an industry that decrees girls should read books with pink, sparkly covers while boys manfully cope with rearing beasts, they are now segregated into age groups which are meaningless. As any educationalist will tell you, biological age has little to do with reading age. My 8 year old daughter reads four to five years above her age and adores those beasty books meant for boys. Surely this is about knowing the individual child and feeding their reading needs accordingly? And to help those confused adults buying books as Christmas presents, nothing can replace a well-informed bookseller. There are any number of them to be found up and down the country running independent bookstores, sharing their wealth of knowledge with customers and providing the type of service supermarkets and faceless chains simply cannot match...03 Dec 09 12:57
By A Bookreader!
Having reached 55 years young am I now too old for WE Johns and Malcolm Saville?03 Dec 09 13:09
By The Swan Princess
Re: Amanda Lees - excellent comment; how right you are in every respect.03 Dec 09 13:46
By Sarah Blackwell
During my years working as a Bookseller, for an Independent Bookshop, it was our responsibility to ensure we knew the content and reading ages of the books in the children's section. It was also one of the most rewarding and enjoyable aspects of the job to recommend titles to children and parents. Most children either knew themselves what standard/age of reading they were at or were just grateful for the help and advice. Also, I think it will be very disheartening for a child, of a lower than average reading age, to be constantly reminded of this fact every time they looked at the book jacket.03 Dec 09 13:53
By Franny
I'm with Maralyn on this one. Although it hasn't affected my school ordering, age guidance certainly affects children chosing their own books. It is particularly hard for reluctant readers or children who are not yet fluent in reading. We will often suggest a book where we know the content can be read on more than one level, so it may well be suitable for very young children, older children and even adults, but if it says on the back suitable for age 6+ a child of 8 or 9 won't touch it. It is noticeable that WH Smiths need the guidance for their customers as their staff probably do not have much of a knowledge of books. This is where "real" bookshops like my own independant or even Waterstones come into their own.03 Dec 09 14:44
By Empty Handed
Just this week I was looking for a children's book to send to a 10 year old niece who lives abroad. I picked up a book, read a little inside, and thought it would be perfect. I then looked at the cover a little more closely, and decided to put it back on the shelf. She is not a native English speaker, but she would have understood that the book was aimed at six year olds. For her level of English, the stories would ahve been perfect. But at that age, she would have been embarrassed by the cover. A label doesn't help. What one person deems suitable for a fourteen year old (Vampire love story) others would deem unsuitable for the intended individual. It's too subjective - subject content is appropriate when judged within your own moral and ethical background. Language and reading level, according to ability, not age. The only people it helps are those who don't want to get involved with the individual, the book or are ignorant sales people who need to stack them on shelves - a world apart from quality book-knowledgeable sales staff, whom I rely on for good advice when buying.03 Dec 09 16:58
By GlasgowBookseller
When did reading anything become quantifiable? I agree that the age guidance notices may be very embarrasing for children, but is the problem not also that these notices will change year upon year? A friend who is a High School English teacher tells me that texts she has to teach (and that many students struggle with) at 5th and 6th year level, are those that we covered in our respective schooling in 2nd year... Indicative also of the obvious dumbing down of all reading habits that any bookseller will tell you. Perhaps childrens books will have an ever decreasing child-reader age notice, and also an ever increasing adult-reader age notice (for the "grown-up cover" Harry Potter books)...? Anyway, my real point is that any rounded individuals reading should surely include books from across the spectrum of supposed age brackets. My copies of The Hobbit and The Borribles, that I bought from the primary school bookclub, still gets re-read alongside with Steinbeck and Calvino.04 Dec 09 09:58
