How Bookstores Use the Winter Catalog: Customer Recruitment
Date postedJune 8, 2026
Reaching new customers is one of the best benefits of the Winter Catalog. It is a marketing piece that stays relevant for the entire season, it can be in places your bookstore isn't, but your customers (and potential customers) are.
"We are distributing them through the local newspaper...This aligns with our neighborhood’s holiday kickoff. We did this last year and had the best response based on coupon use that we have ever had."
— Lynne Phillips, co-owner of WordsWorth Books, Little Rock, AR:
Ideas from booksellers on using the catalog to reach new customers:
- If your store does pop-ups, offsite events, or bookmobile routes, seed places on your upcoming routes with catalogs and info to purchase books online from the digital version, or info to order and pick up when you are in the area.
- Bring catalogs to local independent/assisted living communities and take orders.
- Use the catalog to promote your store as a vital business to your local government officials. Add it to the promotional packet you create to give to city council members, school board officials, or chamber of commerce representatives. Send copies to all your local elected officials.
- Send to school librarians with a handwritten appreciation note and invitation to order.
- Send out catalogs as newspeper inserts to new neighborhoods in your area.