The 2004 Pannell Jury highlights
some of the best ideas in children's bookselling!
Start with babies:
- Hicklebee's Children's Books in San Jose, California has a Baby Registry that engages parents, friends, and family even before the new reader is born!
- UConn Co-op in Storrs, Connecticut has a program to help provide books to all newborn babies in the local hospital.
- Blue Willow Books of Houston, Texas photographs weekly toddler events with a digital camera, makes postcards with the photos, and sends them to the children's grandparents all over the world.
- UConn Co-op markets and handsells to the many faculty members that are grandparents. The faculty comes into the store regularly, and they like to buy books for their grandchildren, so the store is ready for them with old favorites, books on places to visit with kids, and special notices about new books in stock.
- Hicklebee's used an innovative press-conference format for Paul Fleischman's book, Dateline Troy, resulting in standing-room-only turnout of elusive YA readers.
- Dragonwings Bookstore in Waupaca, Wisconsin held a professional-style art show exhibiting the work of elementary and middle school students. The show celebrated the artists as honored guests and included an opening reception, judging, and artwork for sale.
- Kid's Center in Tucson, Arizona runs the ArizonAdopt a Classroom program where community sponsors are recruited from the greater Tucson area to contribute money for teachers to purchase books and other resource material for classroom use. Contributors are matched with teachers in need.
- Oblong Books and Music in Millerton, New York supports the Indian Mountain School's 'Adopt-A-Book' event where the school librarian orders titles she'd like parents to 'adopt' for the school library. Oblong goes out on a limb, and is willing to accept back the books that aren't sold that night. They also host a 'Holiday Shopping Spree' to benefit the school. The store is open exclusively for the school community for the event, and 20% of the proceeds go back to the school.
Winners of the
2004 Lucile Micheels Pannell Award of the WNBA
for Excellence in Children's Bookselling
General Bookstore
UConn Co-op
of Storrs, ConnecticutChildren's Specialty Store
Hicklebee's Children's Books
of San Jose, California
Honorable Mention
Kid's Center of Tucson, Arizona
Oblong Books and Music of Millerton, New York
Thanks to
Artists Denise Fleming and Mo Willems
for their generous donation of artwork for the Award.
The 2004 Pannell Jury
Jenny Abrami - Chronicle Books
Steve Geck - Greenwillow Books
Judy Hijikata - The Reading Connection
Angus Killick - Hyperion Books for Children
Susan Raab - Raab Associates
The Children's Book Council, The Association of Booksellers for Children, The American Booksellers Association, and BookExpo America for their kind hospitality.
2004 Pannell Jury highlights