Over several years, I worked part-time at a fabulous children’s bookstore in Ashland, Oregon: Treehouse Books. Before my bookstore experience, I thought two decades as a children’s magazine and book editor, teaching workshops on writing for children across the country, and becoming a published author of multiple children’s books had taught me all I needed to know about the industry. Wrong! The time spent on the floor of a children’s bookstore totally tilted what I “knew” about how children’s books sell (or don’t sell).

As a writer, I thought about the stories I wanted to write, the kinds of stories I loved reading as a kid or stories that bubbled up out of my life experience. As an editor, I chose stories that spoke to me, as long as they were in sync with what the publisher wanted to bring to the marketplace. As a bookseller, I saw firsthand how people find books to buy and learned why many books never make it off shelves.

I already knew quite a bit about bookstore placement from my years developing and publishing books. I knew about location, location, location! Where a book is placed in a store and how it is shelved can make a big difference in whether or not it sells. Face-out is one of the best ways to sell books and why publishers are willing to pay chainstores big bucks for their books to be featured on end caps. (End caps, to state the obvious, are at the end of an aisle of shelves). Books shelved on end caps don’t get there by accident. The publisher has decided that this book will get a big chunk of the season’s marketing money. The book might have seasonal appeal, be the next book in a mega-selling series, have been written or illustrated by a “big name” in the industry, or be the brainchild of a celebrity “writer.” For small indie bookstores, like the one I worked in, window displays or in-store tables or other face-out placement give certain books extra attention and aid their sales.

As a bookseller, I discovered a hard truth: a lot of wonderful books never make it off the shelf. After huge investments in craft, time, and money by their creators and publishers, far too many books don’t find an audience. They lie forlorn in sale baskets to make room for next season’s books.

Books that DO sell in significant quantities do so for what may be a surprising reason (it certainly was to me). Books that sell do so because book buyers are already looking for them or because they fit into a category that buyers are looking for.

Here are the types of children’s books buyers request most often (in an admittedly subjective order):

1. BOOKS THEY KNOW AND LOVE
   Adult children’s book buyers (parents, grandparents, etc.) often look for books they loved as children. This is why classics such as The Very Hungry Caterpillar, The Snowy Day, We’re Going on a Bear Hunt, If You Give a Mouse a Cookie, and (for older kids) The Wind in the Willows, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Winnie-the-Pooh, etc. continue to sell, year after year and decade after decade.
2. BOOKS ABOUT KIDS’ FAVORITE TOPICS
   Thankfully for children’s bookstores, a lot of people feel good about buying books for the kids in their lives. But: Surprise, surprise! With the exception of parents who pay close attention, gift buyers have no clue what the kids in their lives like to read. What they do know? The child in their life loves PRINCESSES or DINOSAURS or PIRATES or DOGS or CATS or BUNNIES or DRAGONS or FAIRIES or SPACE or SCIENCE or THINGS THAT MOVE (trucks, construction equipment, and the like). For this reason, the savvy owner of Treehouse Books set up the picture book shelves by topic. I always knew that if I could point a buyer to the right topic, they’d buy a book.
   
   Beyond the picture book years, buyers’ requests shift to either SERIES books or book GENRES. For series, buyers request books about many of the same topics listed for picture books, with FRIENDSHIP books taking a spot on the list. They also request books by character names (Junie B. Jones, Mercy Watson, Nate the Great) or if they’re really paying attention, by the series title (Dog Man, Wimpy Kid, Magic Treehouse, etc.). Much-requested genres include funny books, graphic novels, fantasy books, mysteries, and sports books. Once kids outgrow picture books, they will consume every book in a series they enjoy and drag their adults into the bookstore to buy the next in the series or the newest release.
3. SEASONAL BOOKS
   Buyers look for books about pretty much anything related to winter, spring, summer, fall, back-to-school (and other school-related books) or one of the holidays they celebrate or want their children to know about. Seasonal books often rate window or table displays. Their sale season can be short, however, so publishers and booksellers often buy these from creators with proven track records.
4. AWARD WINNERS
   Teachers, librarians, savvy parents, and authors/illustrators look for award winners. If a book has just won the Newbery or Caldecott Medal, a National Book Award, the Coretta Scott King award, a Michael J. Printz award, or a Theodore Seuss Geisel award it will move off the bookstore shelf into readers’ hands. The same goes for state awards, though those don’t necessarily influence purchases outside the home state of the author/illustrator: the Oregon Book Award, The Texas Bluebonnet Award, the California Young Reader Medal, etc.
5. BIG NAME AUTHORS OR ILLUSTRATORS
   Surprisingly, most people looking for books in children’s bookstores have no idea who wrote or illustrated a specific book. Some older kids know the names of their favorite writers, but far more know the name of the series than the name of its creator. A few names have become cemented in buyers’ minds: Jan Brett, Mo Willems…the list of current authors or illustrators is far shorter than I ever imagined. After all, my LIFE is children’s literature and the authors and illustrators whose books I admire (and many I don’t) are top of mind for me. Book buyers do sometimes ask for another book by an author or illustrator whose work they love (but whose name they don’t know), for example, “Do you have another book by the writer of The Gruffalo?” or “Do you have the Harry Potter books?”
   
   Pop-culture celebrity names, on the other hand, do have cache with book buyers, especially those who buy books as birthday and holiday gifts. (Sigh.) But unless you’re an actual celebrity whose name most of the population would recognize, knowing that celebrity books sometimes become bestsellers will probably cause you nothing but angst. So, file this one away and forget about it. (Or be extra savvy and find a way to team up with a celebrity to create a book: the Henry Winkler/Lin Oliver books come to mind).
   

If you’re a writer and selling books is your goal, knowing the types of books that buyers are already looking for can be useful. Avoid the mistake of trying to write a takeoff of a particular bestseller. That yacht has already sailed. Instead, write a book that is your unique take on a topic or category. If you can show readers something new about something they already care about, your book has a much better chance of finding readers.

Before I end, I’d like to acknowledge the power of hand-selling books. If your book worms its way into a bookseller’s heart, consider yourself blessed. It won’t end up in the sale basket. To the booksellers around the world who take time to know the stock in their stores, thank you! These booksellers can literally walk a potential buyer to a shelf, pull out a book, and say, “I think your young reader will love this book!”