Book- Business Lingo

First Try a Trade Show:The Dogwise Success Story“By letting specialized low-volumetitles go out of print, those big compabyLinda CarlsonThe Woodward family got into publishingby going to the dogs, founderCharlene Woodward said with alaugh when we talked recently. Butthe Woodwards are all “small-d” dogpeople, she explained: “It’s ourcustomers who are the ‘big D’dog people, the experts andenthusiasts.” While the Woodwardslove dogs, they’re not dogprofessionals. “Our job,” she says,“is to listen to the breeders, thetrainers, the veterinarians, the shelteroperators, and to serve them.”And that’s what the Dogwise staff hasbeen doing for close to three decades.The company morphed from somethingvery different in the 1980s, whenWoodward’s children were young. Herhusband was scouting locations andopening branches for Seattle FirstNational Bank, and she was in businessfor herself as a book jobber, workingexclusively with technical libraries.One of her husband’s colleagues whobred German shepherds after bankinghours wanted books about dogsand appreciated the obscure titlesCharlene was able to acquire for her.In 1987, she recommended that theWoodwards take a selection of dogtitles from their home in Seattle to adog show a county away.“It turned out to be one of the biggestshows in the country,” Woodwardexclaims. “All we had were samplebooks, and we told people they’dhave to order their copies. They didn’tmind; they were accustomed to that.”Sales at their firstdog show were soimpressive that theWoodwards tookto the road mostweekends after that.Sales at the dog show were so impressivethat the Woodwards acquired someinventory and took to the road mostweekends after that, attending dog showsin the Pacific Northwest and eventuallysplitting the work, with Charleneheading to shows in Canada and husbandLarry to shows in Washington andOregon. Then, when the Woodwardsdiscovered those “big-D” people wantedto order books even when they weren’t atshows, the couple created a simple catalogand got a toll-free number.“I became fearless about calling publishers,”Woodward says. “I was abookseller and I had a resale certificate,so they were willing to sell to me.”Describing a situation familiar to manyfledgling publishers, she adds, chuckling:“You know how it goes. First wefilled up the garage, then it was the guestroom, then we took over the room of thekid who’d gone to college . . . ”Seeing and Filling a GapIn those early years, if the book wasabout dogs, the Woodwards bought it.The longer they listened to their customersand the people they met at dogshows, the more discriminating theybecame in their inventory, seeking specializedtitles that dog enthusiasts andprofessionals had difficulty finding.The business—by then relocated toWenatchee, a small central Washingtoncity—was doing well when cutbacks bymajor publishers created a significantopportunity for Dogwise.34 | IBPA Independent | September 2012