Cornerhouse at the London Book Fair 2011

Recently, Cornerhouse Publications went to Earls Court and exhibited at the London Book Fair. It was a great way to get together with our client publishers and reps, as well as meet with you, our customers – both old and new. We also got the chance to see colleagues from other contemporary art book distributors and publishers, so it was a really useful networking opportunity to find out what was happening. Among our many meetings we met up with colleagues from the Hayward Gallery, Ridinghouse and the Henry Moore Institute. We exhibited over 140 new books and popular titles included John Stezaker , Mark Morrisroe and Loud Flash.

The big thing at the exhibition this year was based around digital publishing – how to get your books published on an e-platform, and the numerous solutions that are now available. The distribution of e-books is a hot topic and this is something that we are keen to get involved with by offering our publishers a way of distributing their e-books. So we need to get to grips with how to go about it and sell this as an extra service we offer. One of our publisher’s designers is currently working with a popular contemporary artist to produce a digital publication and he explained how the technology was advancing regards re-producing images in e-books – something that we are particularly concerned about. So things are moving fast and we aim to be part of this publishing revolution!

Meeting up with our publishers is also a really useful way to learn about forthcoming exhibitions and publications, and to discuss what is selling well and how we can work together on maximising sales.  There is always gossip to catch and we can find out what our competitors are up to – the contemporary art book world is very small and we all know each other so word spreads fast.

We also met with our team of reps, to discuss their sales kit requirements, and to feedback about sales. Some of the reps have a wide area to cover, as we distribute to trade customers all over the world. Some of our customers used the stand to have a look at all the ace new titles that we were exhibiting – and placed orders there and then. New and potential customers took a catalogue and promised that they would order later. We also pushed our digital catalogue too, which was new for us this year, and a really good way of selling our titles.  So all in all, for us, this year’s book fair was a really useful event for us to attend.