Celebrate the first of May by making May baskets with your young customers. Check out this simple Paper Heart Basket from Family Fun which only requires construction paper and simple materials.

 5/5--Cinco De Mayo

Celebrate Mexican Independence Day with your young customers, and make simple paper bag piņatas using brown bags and colorful tissue paper. This project can be done by even the youngest participants.

paper lunch bag

newspaper

candy or other treats

different colors of tissue paper

scissors

glue

hole punch

string

Instructions:

1. Put candy or treats into the paper bag
2. Scrunch up a piece of newspaper and put it in the bag.  Repeat until the bag is full, with the newspaper about 1 inch below the top of the bag (we need the inch so we can close the bag later)
    
3. Cut strips of tissue paper 3 to 6 inches wide and long enough to wrap around the bag (the wider you cut the strips, the quicker the craft will go)
    
4. Fringe the strips by using your scissors to cut about 1/2 way up each strip, 1 to 4 inches apart
5. Glue the strips around the bag, starting at the BOTTOM -- only glue the uncut part, don't get any glue on the fringes.
6.  When you glue on the second strip, overlap it so it comes about to where you cut the fringe.
7.  Repeat until you've covered the entire bag again leaving about 1 inch free at the top
    
8. Punch holes all the way around the top of the bag. 
    
9. Lace a piece of string or wool around the holes and pull tight (You may need to pull out a bit of your newspaper or add a bit extra at this point).  Tie in a loop so you can hang it
    
10. Cut 4 or 5 long strips of tissue paper and glue them to the bottom of the bag as streamers.

5/8--Celebrate Mom's with an "ABC Book of Mom"

Staple together some simple books of white paper using eight sheets of paper folded in half to make books 5.5" x 8.5". Let kids illustrate a book for their Mom where each letter of the alphabet is a great "Mom thing". "A is for ALWAYS picking me up from school." etc. Have an assortment of other ABC books handy to demonstrate the concept. If you're feeling ambitious, you could Xerox the pages with the alphabet letters to make it easier for younger participants. Moms will love the finished projects.

Wicked Lovely

By Melissa Marr

Harper Collins; June 1, 2007; Ages 12 and up

$16.99 HC - 978-0061214653

Snapshot: Twilight meets Buffy the Vampire Slayer in an urban, faery world.

Aislinn has always seen faeries.  Powerful and dangerous, they walk hidden in the mortal world.  Aislinn fears their cruelty-especially if they learn of her Sight-and wishes she were as blind to their presence as other teens.  But now faeries are stalking her.  One of them, Keenan, who is equal parts terrifying and alluring, is trying to talk to her, asking questions Aislinn is afraid to answer. 

Suddenly none of the rules that have kept Aislinn safe are working anymore, and everything is on the line: her freedom; her best friend, Seth; her life; everything.  Faerie intrigue, mortal love, and the clash of ancient rules and modern expectations swirl together in this stunning 21st century faery tale.

"That rarest of combinations: both an exciting plot and gorgeous writing--Captivating!"  - PW Children's Bookshelf

Although Melissa Marr was voted "most likely to end up in jail" in high school, she decided to get an M.A. and teach Lit and Gender Studies to college students across the country.  Along the way, she reports that she has been unable to resist trying new things-including working an archeological dig, slinging drinks at a biker bar, and getting fabulous tattoos. Please visit her on the web at www.melissa-marr.com and help feed her addiction to meeting interesting people.

How to Do One Thing Right by Ted Hurlbut

What do you do better than anybody else? Identify your "one thing" and everything else will fall into place.

As a retail consultant, I tend to look at stores differently than other consumers. When I walk into a store, I find myself quickly taking in the overall concept, the merchandise assortment and display techniques, who the customers are, and how well the sales staff is servicing them. I'm looking at inventory levels and housekeeping and signage, and on and on. I'm always looking for something I haven't seen before, something I can learn, something I can take away and share with my clients.

Sometimes what I see concerns me greatly: Assortments and presentations that seem to be disjointed; housekeeping that's lacking a crisp attention to detail; a sales staff that seems indifferent; a concept that isn't immediately clear to me, and thus not likely to be clear to customers.

And then there are times when what I see just about takes my breath away. Stores that just have it all together. Stores that are exceptionally well thought out, and executed just as well. These are stores that know what business they're in, and what businesses they're not. They know who their customer is, and who their customer isn't. Just looking at the store you know they are very good at the little things. Another thing you notice about these stores -- they're always full of customers.

For any business, large or small, success can be defined as that point where clear-headed strategy intersects with precise execution. One without the other is like the chicken without the egg. It just doesn't work. But unlike the chicken and the egg, we know what must come first in retail. It has to be a strategy, a plan, a vision of where you need to get to as a business and how you're going to get there.

For any small retailer, the critical characteristic of any successful strategy must be focus. Focus is a fundamental requirement of any business strategy, but it is critical if a small retailer is to compete successfully against larger competitors. Small retailers don't have the luxury of doing everything their larger competitors do, or even everything their customers might like them to do. They simply don't have the financial or human resources. They must focus their time and resources on what I call the One Thing.

Strategic focus centers on your core competency, and it comes down to a central question: What is the One Thing that you do best, better than anybody else, better than any competitor, real or potential? What is the One Thing that your customers come to you for, before they go anywhere else? Answering these questions correctly, and precisely, is essential to a successful strategy. With limited time, attention and resources, it's the difference between doing One Thing exceptionally well, so well that you establish a formidable competitive advantage against other retailers, large and small, and doing several things not so well, or maybe just okay.

Here's a mental image that might be helpful. Think of the solar system, the sun and all the planets that orbit around it. The sun is your core, your focus, your One Thing. It's where the heat and light in your business emanate from. Everything else you do revolves around that core. Those products and services that you offer that are most closely related to your One Thing are the inner planets. They live off the heat and light of the core. There is great synergy between the core and these products and services. Conversely, the more distant planets are those products and services most removed from your core. They exist in relative cold and darkness. There is little synergy between them and the core. It is worth questioning whether they are contributing positively to the whole, or are taking more time and attention than can be justified.

You should be able to define your One Thing in a single sentence; two at the most. It should state who you are, what products and services you offer, and who your customer is. Most importantly, it should establish clear boundaries that limit the scope and range of our business to the One Thing. When well crafted, this sentence or two becomes your mission statement, and can serve as a valuable tool to keep you on track.

Identifying the One Thing, and focusing your time and energy on it, can be a very liberating experience for a small retailer. Suddenly, a business that seemed to have a million moving parts, all competing for attention, becomes much simpler. The fog of day-to-day chaos gives way to clarity. Priorities become clear. All of the peripheral, extraneous stuff that seemed to command more attention than it deserved, whether it's marginal product categories, unprofitable customers or struggling stores, suddenly becomes less important. You're able to quickly identify the business metrics that are critical for success. Margins improve. You're able to execute more effectively and efficiently, reducing expenses. Profits improve. You're able to move beyond the immediate moment, and focus on critical mid and long term issues. You're able to provide your team with a compelling vision and a clear set of objectives and expectations.

When you walk into that store that has it all together, what you're really noticing is a strategic focus, combined with precise execution. They make it look simple because they've actually made it simple. Find the One Thing in your business, build your strategy around it, and before long you'll start to notice other retailers coming around, checking out your store, trying to figure out how you make it look so simple, trying to figure out the secret to why you have it all together.

This article first appeared in INC. magazine.

Gotta-Have-It Download of the Month:

Great concise article on Creating Customer Loyalty Programs. What they get you, and why you should do them may surprise you.

Return Children's Books or Pull Out Your Wallet

Once city's problem with delinquent readers (Inside Bay Area.com, 4/18)

Creative Cakes Encourage Reading

In this edible book-eating contest, students had their cakes and read them too (Independent Florida Alligator Online, 4/13)

New Novel by Tolkien, Put Together by Son

(The Wall Street Journal, 4/13)

Why We Need Another Book Prize

You can't do too much for the world of literature, JOHN FRASER argues (Toronto Globe and Mail, 4/12)

Harry Potter Fan Sites Wield Their Influence

(AP-Toronto Star, 4/11)

'Shhh' -- the one thing you won't hear in a library

Sure, times have changed, but can't people shut off their cellphones and quiet down for a little while? (LA Times, 4/10)

The Typing Life

How Writers Used to Write (The New Yorker, 4/9)

(NY Times, 4/9)

The Way We Read Now--Borders Style

(Inside Higher Ed, 4/5)

Why Writers Lie (Hint: We're Partly To Blame)

The latest in the ongoing discussion about truth and memoir (San Francisco Chronicle, 4/3)

Pushing a New Writer Upstream

An Unknown Author, An Ambitious Publisher And Hopes of Big Sales (NY Times, 4/2)

Independent Booksellers Finding it Tough

In the bookselling business, it's the best of times and the worst of times (Atlanta Journal Constitution, 4/1)

Dark Themes in Books Get Students Reading

Critics fear that controversial themes could haunt young readers (Education Week, 3/30)

How to Pick the Best Books for your Child

(Denver Post, 3/31)

All Ages [Graphic] Reads: A conversation with Diamond Kids' Jana Morishima

(Newsarama, 3/26)

You've Read the Novels*; now Read the Footnotes

Annotated editions and period guides are not necessary to grasp the drama of classic literature, but they can enrich one's reading (NY Times, 3/16)

Shipping Harry Potter: How do they do that?

(www.go-explore-trans.org, 3/07)

New England Independent Booksellers Association (NEIBA)
297 Broadway #212
Arlington, MA 02474
TEL: 781-316-8894
FAX: 781-316-2605

Nan Sorenson: nan@neba.org

Steve Fischer: steve@neba.org

____________________________

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Chronicle Books

680 Second Street

San Francisco, CA 94107

415-537-4200 (p)

Phone and e-mail addresses remain the same

Their witty announcement says "We're 40 -- It's time to get our own place."

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