Special Sales and the Gift Market

Special Sales

In addition to its comprehensive approach to the book trade, IPG also operates a five-person in-house department to sell to accounts outside the regular book trade. Sales to these customers represent approximately 15 percent of IPG’s total sales and they are especially important to the IPG publishers because the returns are negligible and many titles sell well for years after they have run their course in the trade.

IPG actively sells to more than 1,200 museum stores—fine arts museums, history museums, science museums, planetariums, and more. While most museum stores do not carry as many titles as a trade bookstore, the right book matched to the right store will lead to substantial long-term sales.

As almost every special interest title has a compatible special interest market outside of the book trade, it is important to prospect for these markets and to present appropriate titles to them.  IPG has the capacity to create, almost instantly, full-color custom catalogs that contain only titles of interest to specialty buyers.

The Gift Market

As part of its special sales efforts, IPG hired its first gift market sales representatives in 2006 and this has become a fast-growing part of our business. IPG currently has over 100 gift market sales reps in the field, participates in more than eight regional gift shows, including major shows in Atlanta and New York, and produces a separate gift book catalog each season to support sales in this market. IPG has space in seven showrooms in gift marts across the United States.

Michael Riley

Gift and Special Sales Manager

Michael joined IPG’s special sales department in 2005. He has many years of book industry experience, including working in chain and independent bookstores, as a museum store buyer, and as a publisher’s field sales representative. Michael manages IPG’s overall specialty sales, including the in-house special sales team, the gift market field sales force, and IPG’s presence at several specialty trade shows. He sells to a variety of specialty accounts, including several high-profile gift and trend chain stores.

Berianne Bramman

Special Sales Representative

After a decade of bookstore experience, both chain and independent, Berianne Bramman joined IPG in 2005 as a customer service representative and then later moved to the national accounts department, where she worked behind the scenes providing sales support to Barnes & Noble and Borders. Now a member of the special sales department, Berianne markets books to an array of specialty retailers, wholesalers, mail order catalogs, and online resellers predominantly in the fields of music, spirituality, crafts, cooking, health, performing arts, sociology, and genre fiction, among others.

Annette Hobbs

Special Sales Representative

After completing New York University’s Summer Publishing Institute in 2005, Annette joined HarperCollins Children’s Books as a subsidiary rights assistant and later became the department’s author and estate specialist. She later worked in the Random House Children’s group as a licensed brand and mass channel marketing associate. At IPG Annette sells to a variety of specialty wholesalers, mail order catalogs, online resellers, and retail outlets and her category focus includes accounts in the outdoor, gardening, sport, and regional markets, as well as in museum stores and public lands/national parks.

Mindi Rowland

Special Sales Representative

After starting out as a store manager with Crown Books in 1993, Mindi has worked with a number of local publishing companies in various positions, most recently as Special Sales Manager for Triumph Books for eight years prior to sales team at IPG. With more than 20 years in the publishing industry, Mindi has been focused in on the special sales area since 2000. Her category focus is in sports and fitness and she sells to various types of accounts including specialty wholesalers, mail order catalogs, online resellers, retail outlets, and some national retail chains.

Kevin Siegel

Sales Associate

After graduating from Marquette University in May 2009, Kevin began working at IPG as an intern followed by a full-time position in the special sales department beginning in June 2010. Kevin provides sales support to the in-house special sales representatives, works extensively with the gift rep sales force, and sells to a number of accounts, including select zoos and aquariums.