A Lighter (up)Load

At its national sales meeting in Bermuda this past weekend, Random House told its field sales reps that they'll soon be receiving a fancy gift: a Sony Reader. According to RH spokesman Stuart Applebaum, “We have bought several hundred of the devices.” Random's announcement follows on the heels of similar initiatives at other big trade houses, including Hachette, S&S and St. Martin's, all of whom are buying Sony's e-book readers for their sales, marketing and editorial staffs in order to reduce paper waste and expense, to expedite a manuscript's passage through various hands and departments, and to lighten the bags of employees used to carrying three or four heavy piles of paper every day.

Daniel Albohn, Sony's manager of new business development, who initiated the Reader project in the U.S., anticipated publishers' enthusiasm for the Reader: “It has big advantages,” he said. “For paper-intensive tasks, it can reduce the tonnage of paper, toner or ink. When you add the electronic delivery of files, you can also reduce shipping costs.” The Reader can display MS Word files.

Phil Madans, Hachette's director of publishing standards and practices and the head of the company's just-completed Sony Reader rollout, was amazed at how quickly staff took to using the devices: “We started this around last Thanksgiving. I've been here 17 years, and I've never seen anything accepted so quickly.” More than 300 Readers were handed out in the U.S. and England. Hachette is using the Reader across departments, Madans explained: “Editorial is asking for digital submissions; once the manuscripts are accepted, we move into the sales and marketing area, where they get the manuscripts in process. For this spring's list, we put everything on the Readers.”

Matt Baldacci, v-p and director of marketing and publishing operations at St. Martin's, is equally excited: “There can be a major saving in time—we don't have to photocopy manuscripts. We can get one to a sales rep in San Francisco, for instance, in a couple of minutes.” Baldacci also noted that editors can quickly switch among hundreds of books: “If you see something and say, 'hey, that's not for me,' you can immediately go on to something else.” St. Martin's is still testing the product in-house, but hopes to distribute hundreds soon.

Applebaum expects speedy results from the distribution of Readers at RH: “Our goal, which we hope to reach quickly, is to eliminate altogether manuscript dispersal to our sales group.” Madans also envisions a quick return on Hachette's investment. “We looked at how much we were spending on paper, postage, ink. A 400-page manuscript would cost $7 to print,” said Madans. “In the first couple of seasons, the Reader will pay for itself.”