The SA Booksellers AGM

Members of the SA Booksellers Association and the Publishers’ Association of South Africa (PASA) gather once a year to discuss matters pertaining to the industry, to be inspired by guest speakers and to catch up with the latest trends on both a local and global scale. This year the co-located AGM’s and the celebratory Sefika and Booksellers Choice Awards will take place in Cape Town, at the Vineyard Hotel on the 30–31st August.

The co-located AGM’s offer a unique opportunity for networking and key insights to the industry via the two-day conference. This year the Education and Academic session will be joint sessions with both members of PASA and the SA Booksellers’ Association in attendance. The sessions of eight panelists will be chaired by a leading commentator in the industry.

The annual Sefika awards dinner will take place during the AGM. The Sefika awards commend both booksellers and publishers for the roles they play in promoting literacy and a culture of reading by producing and selling quality books in South Africa. Previous winning booksellers include the likes of The Book Lounge, Exclusive Books, Van Schaik, Adams Books and Hargraves Library Services. Publishers previously lauded include Pan Macmillan, Oxford University Press, Macmillan Education and Berlut Books.

The final award for the evening, the Nielsen Booksellers Choice Award is bestowed upon a local author for a South African published book that booksellers most enjoyed selling or that sold so well that it made a difference to the bottom line of booksellers across the country. This is a very special award that was won last year by Marguerite Poland with her book The Keeper, published by Penguin Books South Africa.

“Nielsen is very proud to continue its sponsorship of the Booksellers’ Choice Award, to promote and celebrate South African publishers, authors and booksellers,” says the company in a recent message to members.

“The Nielsen Booksellers’ Choice Award was first started in 2000 and is chosen by you, South African booksellers who nominate the book that most appealed to you and your customers.” The voting process is pretty rigorous and ensures that the book trade select the winner from a range of books on a wide variety of subjects.

“We are asking you to select the title you most enjoyed reading, promoting and selling during 2015. To help you select from the huge numbers of books published, The SA Booksellers Association will provide a list of titles to help booksellers make their choice.”

This award can only be presented to books written by South African authors who are published in South Africa. We hope all of our members will get behind this promotion and give it their full support.

“Nominations will need to be submitted no later than Friday 24 June, after which the shortlist will be announced. Nielsen Book will be supporting the instore promotion of shortlisted titles with sponsored posters, stickers and window banners. We are asking publishers to ensure that shortlisted titles are fully stocked and available so they are able to provide you with the necessary in-store support to guarantee this promotion makes a real impact on sales.

“We hope that you will all support PASA and SA Booksellers’ Association Conference and attend the Dinner where the winning author will be presented with a cheque for R20,000 alongside their certificate and award. We can’t do it without you!”