At a lively Sunday evening reception, the American Booksellers Association welcomed 973 indie booksellers from 571 bookstores, 304 publisher reps, and 75 vendors to Denver for Winter Institute 2025, the American Booksellers Association’s 20th annual gathering. The show officially kicked off this morning with a breakfast keynote presentation featuring Ocean Vuong, to be followed by a day of education and networking opportunities.

For the first time in its 125-year history, the ABA held a pre-conference gathering on Saturday, Ignite, dedicated exclusively to BIPOC booksellers. The program featured a rep picks session that showcased books by BIPOC authors, two educational sessions, a reception featuring BIPOC authors and editors presenting their books, and two affinity group meet-ups. ABA CEO Allison Hill told the approximately 120 booksellers in attendance that the program “was created with great love and intention”—a subtle nod to the BIPOC booksellers at last year’s Winter Institute who demanded the ABA pay more attention to their concerns in its conference programming.

While an air of celebration over the historic nature of the occasion was palpable, so was a sense of urgency over the ongoing efforts by the Trump administration to undermine diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives. Several of those addressing the booksellers during Ignite thanked them for the work they are doing during these unsettling times.

“In a moment when books are being challenged, voices are being silenced, and fascism is creeping into every facet of public life,” declared Viking executive editor Ibrahim Ahmad, “you are the ones on the front lines of sustaining culture and making sure that stories that matter find their way into the world. That is no small thing.” Amistad executive editor Rakesh Satyal added: “You’re not just on the front lines: you are the front lines.”

There was a consensus among those at Ignite that it was well worth spending the extra day in the Mile High City to attend the meeting. Andrew Pineda, co-owner of 27th Letter Books in Detroit, “appreciated how being with my people grounded and helped calm me before the all of the activity that’s to come in the next few days.” He could not assess whether or not the education session he attended was productive, “because I felt being in community superseded the relatively short sessions, given their subject matters.”

David Landry, co-owner of Class Bookstore in Houston, the member of ABA’s DEI advisory council who suggested the idea of holding a pre-conference meeting, said that “Ignite is dope in and of itself. Watching BIPOC booksellers come together and talk with one another was a joy to see. I observed plenty of constructive activity at Ignite and my hope is that people who attended will speak their mind and heart on the post-event survey. [And] I hope that the ABA will take heed and strive to improve where they can and preserve the things that they are told that worked.”

Independent Publisher Caucus summit

Sunday also featured the Independent Publishers Caucus’s annual summit, which this year emphasized how publishers could better partner with booksellers to build strong relationships that benefit all.

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The four-hour mini-conference drew about 65 publishers and began with Maya Marshall, the poetry director at Haymarket Books, and Wayne Miller, the editor of a literary journal, Copper Nickel, in a conversation billed as “Indie Publishing and Poetry in Times of Crisis.” The conversation veered between the philosophical and the practical, with the pair discussing what poetry means to them and to society before moving the conversation into more practical matters, including how publishers can support literary journals and organizers of poetry events can draw audiences.

Panelists on an education session discussed the importance of backlist and how publishers could better promote those titles. Kim Wylie of Ingram Publisher Services and Christie Henry of Princeton University Press both emphasized the importance of targeting consumers with metadata, urging publishers to strategize on keywords and to keep the metadata updated. Beacon Books’ Alyssa Hassan noted that Beacon often marks various anniversaries by issuing new editions of its evergreen backlist titles. Angela Schwesnedl, co-owner of Moon Palace Books, agreed with this marketing strategy, as “attractive new covers” draw customers to backlist titles that they might otherwise overlook. “Figuring out a way to keep backlist fresh is a challenge,” she admitted.

Schwesnedl urged publishers not to send emails that “try to sell me everything,” but rather, to curate lists of backlist in such a way that booksellers can readily determine whether a title is a good fit for that bookstore. She added that she relies on reps regarding backlist, because they know what works in her store and what doesn’t. She also noted that half the bestsellers on BookTok do not sell well in her store.

IPC’s third education session featured a panel that included two publisher reps, Terrie Akers of Other Press and Nic DuFort of Penguin Random House, along with two bookstore owners, Veronica Liu of New York City’s Word Up Community Books and Christina Pascucci-Ciampa of All She Wrote Books in Somerville, Mass. The panelists focused on how publishers could better build solid relationships with new bookstores.

“Reach out and give them a list,” DuFort said, but don’t overwhelm them. “If you are a publisher with a backlist of 800 titles, just give them a list of the top 20.” Pascucci-Ciampa emphasized that reps “can explain better the eco-system of book sales,” a point that DuFort agreed with. “There’s a whole new language [booksellers] have to learn,” she said. “Nuts and bolts things are what they really want to know about.”

All four panelists emphasized the importance of getting to know new bookstores by perusing websites and interacting with booksellers on social media to more effectively build relationships and tailor marketing and promotions to particular stores. “The more you get to know them, the more they get to know you; it’s reciprocal,” DuFort pointed out. “You don’t have to be over the top; just make sure you are aware of us,” Liu added, “It’s about understanding what that bookstore is, and what’s a good fit for that bookstore. It’s the personalization aspect.”

The traditional Winter Institute opening night reception took place this year in the iconic Fillmore Auditorium, which opened in 1907 as the Mammoth Roller Skating Rink, and is now a concert venue.

An earlier version of this story misstated the anniversary that the ABA is celebrating this year and has been corrected.