Bungled Bundles = More Work/Frustration

Part of our strategy this year was to capitalize on our large backlist of titles. This involved repackaging several older titles in bundles to sell (more or less exclusively) to Borders Books.

This has been very successful for us, so the bundles keep coming. When we first release them Borders has a big preorder on file. Our warehouse ships the individual books to a packaging company who bundles them with postcards that have the bundle UPC code on them. Then the packager ships them to our distributor who sends them out to the 400 or so different Borders book stores.

Our first bundles went off without a hitch, and gave us some much needed capital during a particularly lean time. We've listed several other bundles. Some for the summer book season, and one for holiday sales later this year.

In the meantime, Borders reordered the first two bundles we launched. Even though they weren't supposed to. They were no longer available through wholesalers. It was up to us if we wanted to fill these reorders.

For one bundle there was no way. One of the titles was now out of print, and I didn't see justification for another run on it. For the second one...yes, I could fill the order, but it wasn't a large enough batch to use the packaging service. If I wanted to get these bundles out it would mean gathering a crew of staff and friends in Las Vegas and having a 'Book Bundling Party.'

My friends are working endless hours at their jobs so that they're not the next head on the chopping block. The only day I could get everyone together for my 'Bundling Party' was Saturday, March 6th.

My house is almost on the end of on a deadend street. It's quiet enough for us to put tables in the street and work outside in the beautiful Vegas weather. I set everything up. Tables and chairs. Shrinkwrap equipment. Inserts. Beer. Books.
Books?

This is when I realized my warehouse had sent me volume 2 of one of the titles I needed instead of volume 1.

That was not a good day.

Today is Bundles - Part 2. And it's just me and one staff person. All the other fires I need to put out have to keep burning until we get this done. Hopefully it won't take more than one day. I don't think we'll be taking reorders again.