I didn’t attend the final day of the Christian Book Expo yesterday in Dallas. Instead, Gail and I visited my parents in Waco. However, I promised I would share my summary thoughts on the event.
Let’s start with the obvious. The attendance at the show was abysmal. There’s no way to spin this or ignore it. We only got a fraction of the audience we were anticipating. According to ECPA (as quoted in Publishers Weekly), only about 1,500 consumers showed up. Frankly, we were hoping for 15,000 to 20,000.
If consumers had come, this would have been an incredible show. The “product” itself was superb. Programming, production, logistics, displays—everything was first class. The evening events were especially well-produced and effective. (Thank you Chris Thomason.) I could not have been happier with the quality of the show.
So then, why didn’t it work? We built it. But they didn’t come. Why?
Before we beat ourselves up too much, let’s remember two facts: first, we planned this more than two years ago. It was a very different economy. Many things made sense then that don’t make sense now. Our goal was to raise the visibility of Christian products, and this seemed like a great way to do it. What we didn’t anticipate was the worst economic downturn since the Great Depression.
Second, hindsight is 20/20. Any of us can look back and see the obvious misses. Unfortunately, things aren’t always so clear before they happen. Despite the fact that things didn’t turn out as we hoped, I’m proud of the fact that we abandoned “business as usual” and tried something new.
Now that I’ve got that out of the way, here are some of the “mistakes” I think we made and which can inform us going forward, should we decide to do so.
- The venue was too big. As Chip MacGregor stated,”the leadership at ECPA swung for the fences,… But they whiffed.” We should have probably done this in a mega-church in a more accessible part of town. The enormous scale of the Dallas Convention Center only highlighted the smallness of the crowd.
- The venue was in the wrong part of town. As I discovered in talking to locals, no one wants to come downtown for an event. The challenge and expense of parking is just more hassle than it’s worth. Plus people were concerned for their safety, especially at night.
- The event overlapped with spring break. Thousands of people were on vacation. But the mothers who stayed home couldn’t get away, because the kids were out of school and childcare would have been an added expense. I’m not sure how this happened; my guess is that we didn’t really have a choice. As a first-time event, you don’t have a lot of leverage with venues.
- We shouldn’t have charged for the event. I don’t know how we would have made the business model work, but the truth is, it didn’t work any way. Again, as Chip pointed out, people aren’t going to pay for the privilege of being able to buy books. Not in today’s environment.
- We should have given ECPA a bigger marketing budget. We spent all our money on the venue, production, and logistics. We should have downsized all of this and spent our money on marketing—especially on billboards and lots and lots of radio. We counted on our member publishers and local churches to get the word out. Frankly, it just wasn’t enough. Either it didn’t happen or it wasn’t effective. People stayed home in droves.
I am not sure publishers are going to want to try this again next year. With the current economic realities we are all facing, we really can’t afford to try too many things that don’t promise an immediate payback. That doesn’t mean that Christian Book Expo is a bad idea. It may just mean that we have to re-launch this at a different time with a different model.
One final comment: I am proud of Mark Kuyper, President and CEO of ECPA. Anyone can be a “Monday Morning Quarterback” and second-guess the decisions that were made. But the truth is that Mark executed the plan exactly as approved by the board. He and his team poured their life into this project and gave it their very best effort. I think we can all feel very good about the quality of the event. We simply need to determine where we go from here.
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Yes, I should have mentioned that. It was also a competing event.
Colleen,
Thanks for the affirmation. i was proud of my team as well. it was good to see you there and I would love to get copied on any notes that would be appropriate. Blessings.
Larry, I agree. We started with the word "Fair" instead of "Expo" and had input to change it. From the feedback we have had too many people thought it was trade oriented. Book Fairs traditionally have workshops and seminars, so now I wish we had stuck with it. There are some other good options as well.
In all of our communication we focused on the authors and the workshops. All of our promotional material featured authors front and center, with the phrasing, "More than 150 Transforming Seminars Led by Authors" (or some variation). I think we just didn't get enough people to see more than the name of the conference.
Thanks, Mary. I read your post and agreed with almost everything you said.
Daniel, you are right. We really need to know who we are marketing to if we are to be effective. Before the event we asked consumers about their interest in a book fair concept with workshops and exhibits and got a very enthusiastic response. This is consistent with the anecdotal response we have had so far from everyone who attended. We also met with church leaders to find out what elements or content they would want to be a part of the event so they could enthusiastically support it with their congregations. Most of the feedback supported what we had already proposed but we did make modifications based on their input. We also researched tag lines and the clear winner was word "Transformation" which we added to our marketing materials. We surveyed pastors via Barna Research and found that most pastors would value the program at between $200-$300 for admission. When people thought of it as a conference, the price was not too high. We got the same feedback from live discussions with pastors and consumers. Of course we went with a fraction of that amount. Depending where attendees (or potential attendees) got their information, if they saw it merely as a huge bookstore, then our price was too high. We have had a lot of feedback on creative pricing options, so we will likely adopt a different strategy if we continue in the future. We will be doing follow up surveys with attendees and exhibitors.
I am so glad it was such a wonderful experience for you, and I thank you for your suggestions and encouraging words
Cecil, it was good to see you there. We will definitely consider your suggestions and look at those options as we put together a possible plan for next time. We did consider many of these for 2009. Our challenge was space. We asked publishers how much booth space they would expect to use and how many authors/workshops they would need. If we were to try to accommodate thier requests, our only option was the Dallas Convention Center. if we were to move ahead we would likely have far fewer publishers and authors so we could fit into one of the other options available. By the way thanks for volunteering to help spread the word next time!! (If there is one.)
I agree with much of your post, but would add some of the following. To blame much of it on the economy is maybe too strong. Of the attendees that came to the audio booth shared by Christianaudio/Oasis Audio, none had any misgivings regarding purchases. They were thrilled with the significant discounts and great selection. We had a great response from those that purchased. The main issue was the fact there were no consumers in attendance in spite of the great looking facilities, amazing authors in attendance and workshops provided, and other educational opportunities available. Speaking with various other publishers, authors, and event attendees, I heard multiple similar issues. 1)Publicity. There was no event information from local Christian radio, pastor/church email, bookstore offerings, etc. 2) The convention center was great, but was not a destination for an Expo such as this. 3) The cost to get in. To spend a sizable sum to attend, consumers must see the value in going. It is riskier in attempting something like this on a grand scale.
I would also be hesitant to recommend one of the area mega churches for the reason being many pastors don’t send their flock to a different church. As the discussion continues, it would be great to offer suggestions regarding possibilities for next year. Hopefully, the lessons learned from this can be applied to CBE 2010.
Janet, yes, we paid careful attention to what both consumers and churches thought about the development of the event. This was first and foremost a conference with 150+ workshops and seminars. We had several sessions directed toward pastoral staff and topics they would find interesting. We encouraged our publishers to provide programming for everyone from theologians to casual readers, and i think they had it covered. One Dallas area pastor with a congregation of 10,000-12,000 said he believed it was the largest Christian conference ever held in this country. The exhibit floor is like the retail outlet at the end of a ride in a theme park. Many attendees were there for the experience of the workshop and wound up wanting to buy something. Every pastor I spoke with was a reader himself, and was excited about encouraging his congregation to read by promoting the event. Christians who take in the Word of God and the wise counsel of Godly men and women on a regular basis, are more likely to become fully devoted followers of Christ. I never had an objection from them pastors about sending their staff or encouraging their congregation to attend. By the time the event was nearing, I think something was lost between the pastors decision when I was in the office and those who would actually distribute the information. I do agree that a church is probably not the best venue for this event.
Mark, your team and you provided a first-class event during this CBE. We North Texans just wish more of our people would have know about it.
I was an exhibiting author at CBE. My impression is that many of the attendees were aspiring authors. They seemed to see it as a way to increase their understanding of the industry. I talked for ten minutes with one couple who were asking basic questions such as the difference between royalty and custom publishers.
As others have said, few local people I talked to had heard or seen very much publicity about it.
Indeed, Mike, thanks for working on learning from the mistakes.
I was an exhibiting author at CBE. My impression is that many of the attendees were aspiring authors. They seemed to see it as a way to increase their understanding of the industry. I talked for ten minutes with one couple who were asking basic questions such as the difference between royalty and custom publishers.
As others have said, few local people I talked to had heard or seen very much publicity about it.
Indeed, Mike, thanks for learning from the mistakes.
Good stuff Mark. Glad you guys are taking a proactive stance on this and doing your best. Anything new is always a risk. Kudos to you and your team for taking that risk. If you do it again next year, which it sounds like you should, I'd be happy to offer my marketing services to help.
I forgot to mention that the Festival of Books is free to attendees, but parking at UCLA is $8.
Cudos for trying Mark and ECPA. And great wrap up here Mike (Wonderful to see you and Gail there). Agree, production values were second to none, great opportunity to meet authors. Agree with improvements noted above. One new thought may be to not create our own event but instead tie into other well known events. Wouldn't it be FANtastic to have signfiicant presence at the well established MIAMI BOOK FESTIVAL, or other festivals across the country. Just noodling here.
I like that idea a lot. One thing lacking at the Los Angeles Times Festival of Books is a strong Christian presence. It would be great to go "coast to coast" with Los Angeles and Miami!
Ha! I just asked our event planner to check Miami and LA out yesterday!! Glad you think it's a good idea!!
I had no idea it was for the general public. I thought it was for book buyers from stores like the other large book events. So my questions would be:
- why would a Christian book buyer pay to go inside a large book store? To meet some authors? To browse a large selection of books? what was the point of this expo? I am still confused.
- as someone who buys a lot of books, why would I fly to Dallas for this? what advantage does going there help me as a book consumer? were there a lot of seminars like a conference? what would draw me to this when I can look online for books to browse vs. flying somewhere? Or was this for Dallas folks primarily?
I would maybe go if:
- there were enough seminars of interest for the average person, not just church leaders
- it was known this would be a massive discount on books at this event (at least as much as amazon.com)
- it was free, or close to free. maybe a minimal fee.
- maybe if it s was designed more like ComicCon in San Diego. that draws tens of thousands. I have been there and it is a Comic Expo, but much more. Maybe you should look at that model to see what they are doing in drawing in such large numbers.
those are some thoughts!
Mike – I wanted to encourage you and the industry as a whole that this type of consumer driven show can work and work tremendously. As you know, I lived in southern California for years, and one of the highlights of the year for me is the Festival of Books held on the last weekend of April at UCLA. It is amazing to see publishers, retailers, and consumers massing at the UCLA campus to celebrate books and reading. It is really something else. And even though we moved to Arizona, my 15 year old son and I are going back. It's something we plan on doing every year. The link for info is <a href=”http://www.latimes.com/fob” target=”_blank”>www.latimes.com/fob (the stages and panels are not yet set for 2009, but I believe you can see who was there in 2008). Blessings to you. Ron
Out of curiosity, were meetings set-up with local pastors of the mega-churches in TX? I'm sure they would have announced the events and publicized them in the church book stores.
I know Max Lucado was included, but were invites given to Rick Warren, T.D. Jakes, John Hagee, Joel Osteen – there are so many pastors that are well-known. I know Joyce Meyer and Beth Moore would have been big attraction for women.
I'm a big Christian Fiction fan, but it seemed your nonfiction authors and their platforms should have been highlighted up front. A lot of Christians still prefer nonficion and fiction is still new to them.
Also, I've learned that the African American audience was included more as an after thought instead of integrated more into the expo. There are CBA African American authors that are well-loved and would have brought you an enthusiastic crowd. I hope this is considered next time.
Didn't mean for this to be such a long post. But I've been curious about the expo since this past weekend. I hope to see it rise up in a year or two with more success.
I didn't read all these threads but I think you may have missed an obvious: the christian movement is moving toward the margins again. it's not just that the economy stinks, many of the people at the center of this mess are leaders who label themselves christians. the former president, Tom Debay, that Senator caught in the public bathroom co-noogling with a young man—the list goes on.I live in Orange County, specifically Newport Beach, home of the christian far right. Last week, president obama's visit here caused traffic jams and brought people from all walks to the fair grounds. Young Republicans love this man; they've moved beyond their parent's ideology that defines christianity narrowly. If you want your next book expo to be successful, catch this wave.
I'd be careful to not get sidetracked by the #2 comment of "no one wants to come downtown for an event," because to begin with, 1,500 apparently did in this case, and I know there are plenty of well-attended events in downtown Dallas.
So "only 1,500 people wanted to come downtown for this event," or "the people we are targeting for this event tend to not attend events downtown" may lead you in a more productive direction, and immediately open up the question of "where would our target audience most likely show up for this event?" which could help something like this in the future.
Maybe nobody believes in the crap your selling.
All religions are Fairy Tales.
We need to remember this was a beginning effort.
1) The event (authors mixing with readers) could easily become a tradition consumers look forward to it each spring.
2) The golf outing and Thurs. night dinner were wonderful and would probably both grow in size next year.
3) Adjust the model, somehow, to make it free at the door.
4) I agree with a smaller venue.
Anyway, thanks for choosing Dallas, TX. Hope we can hold it here again next spring as I think it will organically grow through reputation and human (face-to-face and word-of-mouth interactions.
Mike,
I appreciate your candor in not trying to sugar-coat the results and being willing to consider some of the factors (in hindsight) that contributed to the lack of success of the event. I'm a member of one of the largest churches in the Dallas area and to my knowledge not one bit of information was ever passed on to our congregation. Did our staff know and ignore it? I doubt it. Lack of publicity was one of the major problems in my view. Was any effort made to enlist the help of the authors in the area (there are quite a few of us) in publicizing CBE? If so, it didn't reach me or most of my colleagues.
I do hope ECPA can pick themselves up, dust themselves off, take a long look at what needs to be done to make this work, and try again next year.
Has no one considered the obvious? The fixation by the 'Christian Right' on gay marriage, so-called Intelligent Design, constant money-raising, and internal theological disputes has left much of your audience alienated.
Who would be interested in attending an event so divisive, so smug, and so contrary to American precepts of tolerance? I daresay that the wildly popular writings of Christopher Hitchens, Richard Dawkins and Sam Harris are having an effect as well. To say nothing of the father-son disputes at ORU and the Crystal Cathedral, church pedophile scandals, and 'faith-healing' exposés…
As long as your 'leaders' include such bullies and crackpots as James Dobson, Pat Robertson, Benny Hinn, the exposed charlatan Peter Popoff, Earl Pauk, Ted Haggard, Creflo Dollar and the rest, few and fewer decent people will be interested in your message. No wonder.
Just back from vacation and catching up on some reading…it seems I've made it in time to land amongst the angry folks.
In all of the comments I've read through I'm still missing an important definition:
Who is the target market for the event?
The event seems to have been targeted at: publishers, retailers, homeschoolers, christian schoolers, church attenders, and perhaps christian readers in general. In that last category alone you'd have a vast chasm between the needs, wants, desires of a 65 year old grandmother and a 21 year old college student…and the answer "we have something for everyone" typically means "you have very little that applies to me"…especially if I have to pay to attend and then sort out which bits, if any, really do apply to me.
Even at large events where there are different "tracks" those that do not apply to me are non-entities. They are pure cost with no return because I don't care about them. The more tracks then, or the more audience segments, the larger you have to have in each "successful" track to make up for the ones that don't draw.
Even as I was reading your daily posts, Michael, I still thought it was an industry trade show you were talking about. Reading through this post and the various comments that follow I still can't figure out if this was anything I might have been enticed to attend, no matter where or when it was held or what it was called, or how it was valuated by pastors.
I would have asked myself, as a potential attendee, a standard marketing question: What problem does this solve for me or value does it provide for me?
But then again, I may not have been the audience you were hoping for.
This almost sounds like it was planned as "a cool thing for the industry" that had some chance of being successful as a marketing tool in and of itself.
So again it makes me wonder..who was the intended customer?
I think our target audience was readers of Christian books and prospective readers of Christian books. That may have been too broad; I don't know. Regardless, we clearly did not connect with this audience in any meaningful way.
While the logistics of this event failed it is in the philosophy of this event that was it’s true demise. The Christian products industry is deeply fractured. Groups have decided to host their own shows instead of pulling together. If CBA, MUNCE, Strang, GMA and ECPA actually could work together a successful show might be possible, but until that happens all you are getting is a bunch of failed shows that is deeply hurting the market. With much due respect Mr. Hyatt it is also very concerning to me that some publishers had such a large presence at this failed event yet have pulled out of ICRS where your buyers are actually attending. To the stores and buyers this is a rather insulting. I am open to proactive solutions, but it doesn’t take a genius to recognize this show was D.O.A (Dead on Arrival) even before the recession. Failed philosophy = Failed event.
Thanks for your comments. This show was intended to be a CONSUMER show. All the others you mentioned are TRADE shows. If this were intended to be a trade show, then I agree: we don't need another one. The fact that it was perceived as such, is probably why it did, in fact, fail.
We pulled out of ICRS because we do not believe that trade shows are a cost-effective way of connecting with retailers. Instead, we spend a ton of money each year to actually call on 95% of these accounts either face-to-face or via the phone.
Trade shows are fine for small publishers who don't have sales forces or for small retailers who don't do enough sales volume to warrant the visit of publisher reps. But this cost is shouldered by the big publishers who, frankly, don't need the added expense.
In my view, we don't need more events where we are talking to each other (i.e., TRADE shows). However, we still need an event that raises CONSUMER awareness to the incredible products that are being produced by Christian publishers.
Thanks, Michael — This is the clearest "mission statement" I've heard for the event. Your statement resonates: There's a clear need for this kind of connection between publishers/authors and their readership. Well done!
Although I'd personally love to see this event held in Southern California, let me suggest a couple of "out of the box" ideas: Indianapolis & Tulsa. Indy has an historically strong Christian presence, i.e. people would actually turn out for this — it would draw them. Tulsa has ORU, Rhema, Victory Fellowship, Church on the Move, et al — a surprisingly large and vibrant Christian community that, again, would actually turn out.
I'm not a "small market" fan in general, but either of these venues might be a "large turnout" locale. Larger markets may be too jaded (?) or have such diverse options that any given opportunity is just 'more noise.'
You may have a point about Dallas. It has the highest density of Christians and large churches in the country—which is why we picked it. But it may also have too many competing opportunities.
Believe me, we are looking at every facet of this show. Nothing is sacred other than the mission.
That is why I said the philosophy failed– it was direct to consumer. But I firmly believe you help consumer awareness by working with the industry at large. You also raise consumer awareness by assisting those on the frontlines who have relationships with their consumers not by bypassing the them and going direct to consumers in the form of a book EXPO ( modern name for book fair). Let's call a spade a spade- publishers need/want a bigger margin and thinking direct to consumer is more profitable than going through stores. The money spent on this event would have been better used if the publishers had used coop advertising and partnered with stores or authors in several markets rather than hosting a book fair in one market already saturated with Christian products.
I think Thomas Nelson is on the right track by downplaying its presence at ICRS. ICRS, in my experience, has behaved as a moribund, exclusionary show that goes out of its way to roadblock rather than invite participation by exhibitors. I think CBA is stuck in a 20th century mentality, when the industry is experiencing sea changes not unlike those that dislocated monks and scrolls when Gutenberg introduced movable type. Indie booksellers now have only eight percent of the overall $32 billion book retail market. Christian booksellers have a small slice of the indie market. As for diagnosing the reason for low attendance by consumers in Dallas, I'm still waiting for information that will help me in writing an article about the show for the Southern Review of Books, of which I am the editor.
I know Mark Kuyper sent you an email on Tuesday, March 24th. He copied me. Did the two of you ever get a chance to talk?
Mark Kuyper and I are going to talk. I sent him a few more things to think about before we get together by phone. Didn't want to bother you – surprised you can find time to read all the traffic on your blog. Meanwhile, I'm helping to plan a national seminar on self-publishing, a seminar for writers at the Great American Bargain Book Show in Boston in August and trying to help Clark Atlanta University launch a new TV show on books and authors – initially via Comcast to Atlanta metroplex, but already being test-marketed for digital streaming internationally. Also just posted a story on my Energy Pipeline News blog about how Goldman Sachs, Citibank and Merrill Lynch last summer manipulated the crude oil futures market, driving the price of crude oil to $147/bbl. in order to drive SemGroup into bankruptcy and pick clean the bones. Highest traffic I've had at that site since I ran a story about how KBR Halliburton failed to inform U.S. soldiers protecting it in Iraq that they were being exposed to hexavalent chromium – the bad stuff that got Erin Brokovich angry. Brings back memories of my early days as an investigative reporter in Chicago.
I was there – I walked around the empty show floor and watched well known amazing authors sitting uncomfortably as only a few people waited in line to get a book signed. I was there- and I was embarrased for our industry.
Although the retailer got 100%… ( although 100% profits probably didn't even cover their employees parking) it still was a publisher to vendor show.
I mean no disrespect- I just care about our very fragmented industry which is tanking and making poor decisions.
Were you there? Where are you getting your information?
Actually, we didn't sell directly to consumers. We worked with a Christian retailer. They had their registers and their staff in our booth. They took 100% of the retail sales. We sold them our product at our normal trade discounts. Nearly all of the other publishers did the same thing.
This was my assumption…especially when you have what used to be CBA Expo around the same time just a handful of years ago.
Hi, I was there too. One idea that might be entertained is to break it up into regions and smaller venues. More authors would be available then since they could drive over. And finally no entrance fee! Let people choose from a menu and pay for what the workshops and events that are above and beyond the floor. And authors, I gave away books. I viewed this as an opportunity to get new readers.
Well, I'm late in commenting, but thanks for the insightful analysis, Mike.
Lyn Cote