The Black Literary Club, a direct-mail company specializing in African-American literature, is celebrating its fifth-year anniversary. Founded by Annette Vendryes Leach, BLC is a mail-order catalogue that d s not have automatic shipments or minimum commitments.
Leach, BLC's president, told PW that the club's core membership, now roughly 2000, has more than tripled since 1994 and the company now has a mailing list of more than 76,000 names. "We hand-sell to each customer. We're formed more like a community of readers," Leach explained.
For the past year, the club has also had an Internet presence, at www.blackliteraryclub.com. Leach has found that the Web site attracts a younger group of readers interested in contemporary fiction, business and self-help, whereas BLC's core offline members favor history, serious fiction, anthologies and classics.
BLC's full-color print catalogue has grown from 21 titles in 1994 to its current 82 titles and is sent out three times yearly. The online catalogue has more than 160 titles; each catalogue contains books discounted 50%“75% off list price. Fulfillment is done in-house. "We get literally no returns," Leach told PW.
BLC membership includes a frequent-buyer program, a hard-to-find-book search service and a newsletter.
