Penguin Publisher's Giant Warehouse Sale!

I just got back from a rather interesting event; the Penguin Group held their annual warehouse sale where you can purchase new titles for as low as a $1!

First...quick update. Currently my first draft is at 79,492 words. I haven't worked on it yet today because I was at the book sale...

Now for the warehouse sale. The sale took place in an old warehouse. Sounds like the opening for a book, doesn't it?

I've heard horrible things about the literacy rates in America. A tiny percent of Americans read for pleasure anymore; book sales have fallen, staff are being cut from publishers and from what I can find it's harder than ever for new authors to get a contract.

But you wouldn't know that if you were at the sale today.

The line actually wound around the parking lot. Of a warehouse.

We waited an hour just to get in to the warehouse.

Once inside it was packed. Racks and racks of books priced at a huge discount over the cover price. There is simply no way I can imagine that the publisher was making any money on these things.

My wife and I ended up spending $68 on books, and we estimated that these were $400 worth of books (we haven't counted up the cover prices, but considering that any books listed over $60 were %10 of the price, that's probably not too far off). We packed a suitcase with various titles.

Literally. we packed a rolling suitcase with books. You have to carry boxes that they had at the entrance or you could fill a kid's wagon or hand cart or whatever you have handy. They didn't have anything other than boxes; no shopping carts or baskets.

Once inside we found cardboard "aisle signs" directing you to vague sections like young adult and adult titles. It was Black Friday in there; as the warehouse got full they would shut the doors and the line outside would stall for another ten minutes before they would admit more shoppers.

The aisles were crowded; we shuffled through, trying to check out the titles and decide what we may have shelf space for. At those prices it was hard not to grab books to try; even if we didn't need it, there are always people for whom they would make nice gifts.

Leaving was also a challenge since the line to get out took an hour.

But it was worth it.

Check out the link at the beginning of the post for information on the event. It is certainly an event to behold. My question is, with such horrible horrible news coming out about the publishing industry and the general state of American ignorance and unwillingness to read, why were there so many people literally flocking to this warehouse sale?

Could it be the extreme bargains? Is the media overhyping the bad news? Was this a congregation of the small percent of people in the area that do enjoy reading and collecting books? Or is there something about cutting the price down to iTunes-like proportions that makes people show up in droves to get books?

My only complaint was there weren't any graphic novels or technology books to choose from. Then again this wasn't Barnes and Noble; they had what they had, and hey, we left with a suitcase of books for under $70. Good enough for me!