Saturday Gift Post--You are Thinking Mother, but I am Thinking Fa(r)ther Out.

It's a strange thing to have Mother's Day weekend following Easter so closely.  We didn't really get a chance to catch our breath.  I think we started out with about 30 card designs for Mom and I think we're down to about five by halfway through Saturday.  I even picked up some dozens of a few of the folks we normally do well with (like Misha Zadeh from Madison Park) but you have to be prepared for last minute shopping.

By Monday, the Mother's Day card display will be gone, to be replaced by Dad.  We don't sell quite as many Father's Day cards, even though when I was a young bookseller, I was told that Father's Day tended to be a better sales holiday than Mom, as there was no flowers, candy, and lunch ritual.  It was a book or a tie, your choice.  So anyway, the cards are ready to go out, with probably some last minute additions.

Fortunately I don't bring in too many things like frames that say "Mom" that need to be marked down right away.  Unfortunately I sold through these little Paris bags and coin purses way too quickly and couldn't get the restock in in time.  I did a lot of gift restocking this morning, but it was things like file folders (which we sell through pretty quickly since we got a wire display from an office supply store), vintage regional postcards, and puppets.  I don't know if anyone was getting their mother a puppet for Mother's Day.  If so, my apologies as our selection is a little slim at the moment.

Today we moved some tables around, and set the Father's Day table.  It's hard to buy guy-themed gifts for the bookstore, even though it isn't hard to buy guy-themed books. We've got journals and boxed cards and bookmarks that don't scream floral, but I would say that our gift business leans more female than our book business.   I went with a wine theme.  Alas, the publishers mostly went with a sports theme, but no matter how hard I try, I will not sell golf-themed desk sets very well. Our loss, I guess.