How Independent Bookstores Can Increase Basket Size and AOV With Gift and Sidelines

Most people who walk into your bookstore are already interested in buying something. The question is whether they leave with one item or three! Here's how we grew basket size and average order value (AOV) in my shops, and how it translates to your bookstore.

Quick intro: I'm Theresa. I bought gift for my own shops in Tucson and Phoenix for five years. Now I help indie bookstores with their gift buying!

Know your numbers and set a goal

Track AOV and basket size (items per transaction) on every transaction. Your POS should be able to do this for you.

We always had a goal for each, based on our sales data: a number a little higher than our average for the past quarter or six months, and influenced by season. Then we strategized ways to get there.

Train staff on "the next item"

This was a big part of our sales training. If our basket size goal was three items and someone was walking around with two, our associates had ideas for a good third item based on what was already in their hands.

There's always a pairing

• A gift? There's always a card.
• A book? There's always a bookmark.
• A notebook? There should be a pen or two.
• A water bottle? Stickers.
• A hat? An enamel pin.

And that's just products and their accessories. Once you get into books and the themes in them, there are so many more things you can add on.

Book + gift pairings to try

• Book + greeting card. The easiest one.
• Pair to the occasion: a self-care night in, or office items for someone who just started a new job.
• Pair to the book itself: people identify with genres. If it's fantasy, carry stickers and accessories that help readers share that identity with other people.

Recommend before the register

Be helpful, not aggressive. Give people space to browse.

The best time to make a recommendation is before they reach the register. The second best time is at checkout, and that's when it's nice to have popular, easy add-ons right there, so staff can point to them and the customer can pick one up and look.

Keep things at the register that your staff are excited to talk about. And anything at your register should also live somewhere else in the store, the same way greeting cards can be on the card wall and worked into displays where they're most relevant.

Run offers that feel fun

We almost always ran a promotion on stickers, because we wanted people to buy multiples. Sometimes we did cards, too. Something like buy three stickers, get one free. People get to pick their own, which they enjoy.

It's a discount that doesn't make your store feel like "that place that's always on sale, so wait for the discount." It just feels like a fun offer. But you need signage, and your associates need to tell people about it.

Use events to grow baskets

Every ticketed event came with a small discount: 10%. Anyone who came in early was encouraged to browse and reminded of their discount. They didn't have to show us anything. Whoever was working just paid attention, or asked if they weren't sure.

After the event, we reminded people again and pointed them toward anything relevant, like more kits for the activity or items on the event's theme. People love to shop with their friends, and we'd always stay open.

We were lucky to have space in the back of the shop for events, so we could keep the front open (as long as we had staff) while an event ran. The energy and the sight of people gathered in the back working on something drew more people in. They wanted to know what was going on, and they'd shop while they were there. If noise wasn't an issue, we kept the door open.

Start with one

Pull last quarter's AOV and basket size, set a goal a little above it and give your team a few go-to "next item" pairings. That's a great start.