How to get your book into bookstores, one store at a time.

Decide whether shelves matter for your book

Start with the book's job. If the book is mainly there to win clients or book talks, most of its copies will move through your own hands: mailed to prospects, sold at the back of the room, handed out after meetings. A bookstore is still worth having for a local launch event and for the credibility of saying the book is in stores, but it is not where the book does its work. If the book's job is reaching readers you have never met, store shelves matter more, and the terms below are worth setting carefully.

The self-published book guide has a short table for this decision. The rest of this page assumes you have decided you want to be in stores.

What a store needs before it can order

Stores order most of their books through wholesalers, in batches, using the ISBN. If your book does not fit that system, a bookseller who likes it may still not be able to stock it. IngramSpark's guide, How to Sell Your Self-Published Book to Bookstores (updated May 27, 2026), sets out four requirements in a table. Barnes & Noble's Sell Your Book page asks about the same things, plus the spine.

Two more things from IngramSpark's guide are worth knowing before you pitch. First, "most bookstores will start cautiously, ordering only one or two copies until they see how well your book sells." Second, the cover and interior should look like they belong next to the other books in your category: it suggests visiting a bookstore and noting the trim sizes, cover imagery and interiors in your genre.

What returns cost you

Bookselling runs on returns: a store can send back copies it did not sell and get its money back. IngramSpark's article on making your book returnable says "typically, brick and mortar stores will not order a book unless it is returnable," and that this includes big box stores and "most independent bookstores as well."

The cost falls on you, the publisher. In IngramSpark's words: "IngramSpark will charge the publisher for the wholesale cost of returns plus any applicable shipping and handling fees." Its own example: "If you set a retail price for your book of $20 and select a 55% wholesale discount, the result is a $9.00 wholesale cost," and if the book is returned, "we charge you back the wholesale price of $9.00 + the shipping and handling fees."

When you mark a book returnable, IngramSpark gives you a choice of what happens to returned copies:

• Yes, deliver: "You will receive a copy of the returned book." You pay the return charge and can sell or give away the copy.
• Yes, destroy: "Returned units will be shipped back to Ingram and destroyed."
• No: "IngramSpark will not accept returns from booksellers." This is cheapest, and it also means most physical stores will pass.

A sensible way to think about it: a store that orders two copies and returns both costs you two wholesale prices plus fees. That is the price of a trial. Your job is to give the store reasons to sell them, which is what the rest of this guide is about.

Four ways in

1. A local independent store

This is where most nonfiction authors start, and where a personal connection counts most. IngramSpark's bookstore guide gives a summary line worth following as written: "Pitch local indie bookstores in person with a tailored marketing plan." It also suggests becoming a customer first ("Build relationships with indie booksellers by buying books from their stores"), learning what the store sells and what events it hosts, and using that in your pitch. It notes that "some indie stores may prefer consignment or an event to test interest."

Consignment means you supply the copies and the store pays you a share of each one it sells. Terms are set store by store, so ask, or look for an authors page on the store's website. The book signing guide walks through store orders, consignment and bringing your own copies for an event.

2. Barnes & Noble

Barnes & Noble has two separate routes, and it helps to know which one you want.

An event at one store. Its page on how to be considered for an author event says: "If you would like to be considered for an author event, call your publisher or contact the store manager at any local Barnes & Noble store." It adds that its most successful events happen when authors promote their appearances "through mechanisms such as social media, email promotion and networking with local news media and organizations."

Placement on bn.com and in stores. The Sell Your Book page says "Please do not send physical book submissions to the Small Press Dept." Instead, it says that "If you have a compelling marketing plan or expect significant media/publicity that will drive customers to book retailers looking for your title," you can email the department (the address is on that page) with:

• the ISBN of your title in the subject line
• details on your marketing, media and publicity
• the name of the wholesaler or distributor handling your fulfillment to the retail trade
• a link to your title on bn.com
• the author's hometown

The page says "The buyer review process can take 4 to 6 weeks" and "All books will be considered for store placement based on subject matter and salability." It also asks you to tell them "what makes your book unique or special" and to send your publicity and promotional plans, along with any reviews or articles about the book.

3. Conference and event bookstores

For an expert's book, the bookstore at a conference can matter more than any shop on Main Street, because the people walking past are the people the book is for. Erik Huberman keeps a box of books in his trunk. At the Milken Global Summit, the conference bookstore never answered his request to carry his book. The next year he asked in person, carried in a box of 36, and the store sold them on consignment, with the book front and center for the whole event (story). Ask the organizer who runs the bookstore, ask early, and have copies with you anyway.

4. Campus, community and specialty stores

Stores with a reason to care about you are easier to reach than general ones. IngramSpark's guide suggests thinking about "Whether your book is a good fit for a general indie store, a niche store, or the local-interest section of a store." A store tied to your university, your town, your industry or your subject has a built-in reason to say yes. Candler Cook, who wrote about walking on to the University of Georgia football team, does one game-day signing a year, and the campus bookstore stocks up on copies before the event (story).

The pitch: a sell sheet and a script

Whatever the store, you are asking a busy person to take a small risk. Make it easy to say yes. IngramSpark's guide puts the store's side plainly: "The bookstore's only job is to sell your book, not market it." So the pitch is mostly about what you will do to bring people in.

A one-page sell sheet

Bring this on paper and have it ready to email. Fill in every line.

If you need the endorsements or the back cover copy for this sheet, the book blurb examples cover both.

A short script for asking in person

Go at a quiet time, buy something, and ask for the person who chooses the books. Then keep it short:

If the answer is no, ask what would change it. Some stores want to see local demand first. IngramSpark suggests asking friends and family near the store to request your book over time, so it has a record of sales before you approach the manager.

After a store says yes

• Send people to that store. For a launch or an event, point your list and your social posts to the store's own page for the book, not to Amazon. A store that sells out reorders, and it remembers you.
• Promote the event as hard as the store does. Barnes & Noble's events page credits authors who promote their own appearances with its most successful events.
• Create a Bookshop.org author page. IngramSpark's guide suggests it to "support independent bookstores and build your mailing list."
• Thank the staff and follow up. Sign the stock if they want signed copies, and check back after a few weeks to see how it is selling.
• Count what matters. Copies sold, people at the event, sign-ups to your list and conversations that came from it. Lesson 10 covers what to measure.

Scribe authors in bookstores

Charles Daly launched Make Peace or Die during the COVID-19 lockdowns, with no in-person events or signings, and still saw it sell out at local bookstores on word of mouth (story). Craig Stanland traveled to meet readers at bookstores and speak to groups after Blank Canvas came out (story). These four went further:

Notice what the first three have in common: each picked one store with a reason to care, asked, and then filled the room. A single full event at a store that knows you is worth more than a listing in a thousand stores that have never heard of the book.

Sources, read November 2, 2026: IngramSpark: How to Sell Your Self-Published Book to Bookstores; IngramSpark: Why should I discount my book; IngramSpark: Understanding Book Returns; Barnes & Noble: Sell Your Book; Barnes & Noble: How to Be Considered for an Author Event. Terms change; check each page before you set up your book.