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Booksellers are being urged to join a national “Big Bookshop Party” event to help launch the Books Are My Bag (BAMB) consumer campaign on Saturday 14th September.
The Booksellers Association has called on bookshops to host parties and get festive with specially designed bunting to coincide with the launch of the BAMB campaign intended to highlight the joy of books and physical bookshops.
As-yet-unidentified celebrities will feature in photos and posters holding the striking orange and cream BAMB bags, as part of the M & C Saatchi-designed campaign.
Alan Staton, marketing manager for the BA, is encouraging bookshops to hold big parties to coincide with media coverage planned for the weekend of 14th September. He told The Bookseller: “We are encouraging bookshops across the country to host their very own Big Bookshop Parties to bring together their community through face-to-face contact.
Bookshops can invite local authors, hold food tastings with cookbooks, serve special BAMB cocktails, host bag decorating sessions for kids, organise author readings and launch competitions and petitions.” He added: “The Big Bookshop Party is a chance to be noisy and boisterous and celebrate the unique energy of bookshops.”
Bookshops will be given 75 bags to give to customers for free and thereafter can decide whether to sell or give away the other bags they have ordered.
So far 1,805 bookshops have placed an order for 267,000 bags, with participating stores including Waterstones, W H Smith, Blackwell’s, Easons and John Smith’s, among many independent booksellers.