In all the publishing turnovers and takeovers since 1989, Rep of the Year Tom Benton finds himself working for the same company he started with 20 years ago—even after two job changes and a territory move. Benton began working for Viking/Penguin in Chicago in 1989 and moved to Putnam three years later. Even when Benton quit his rep job in Chicago in 1997 to join his future wife in Los Angeles, his ties to Penguin remained.

Benton and Ann Binney met at a sales conference when she was the Putnam rep in New York. A California native, she moved back to L.A. to work for Price/Stern/ Sloan, which had been acquired by Putnam. This led her into a Southern California rep position with Penguin (which had bought Putnam), and when Benton arrived in Los Angeles he was at a loss for work. But only a month later, Binney quit her job and Benton applied for and was given the Penguin job. “Some of the people I worked with at Viking when I first started are still there today,” notes Benton, the 45-year-old father of two. “Everything has come full circle at this point.”

Benton comes from a family of educators in St. Louis, Mo. An English major, he graduated from Indiana University in 1985, and that summer he enrolled in a book publishing program at Howard University in Washington, D.C., where one of his instructors was Marc Jaffe, at that time an executive with Villard Books. Jaffe gave his business card to Benton and suggested the 22-year-old look him up if he ever came to New York. Benton did just that, and was hired to work in the publicity department of Knopf the same day of his interview.

“Talk about an introduction to publishing!” marvels Benton. “I was just a kid from the Midwest, and suddenly I found myself working with people like Bob Gottlieb and Jane Friedman. It was amazing.” This was in 1985, and Knopf's publicity department handled book reviews exclusively, while the separate promotion department focused on author tours and interviews. “This would be unthinkable now,” Benton says, lamenting the steep cutbacks in all areas of publishing. Benton never attended sales conferences during his three years at Knopf, and didn't meet any sales reps. “I never even thought about how books were sold—it just didn't occur to me back then.”

In 1988, Benton left Knopf to return to the Hyde Park neighborhood of Chicago to be near his family and met Jack Cella, who hired him to be a bookseller at the Seminary Coop Bookstore on the University of Chicago campus, and the future rep finally learned how books are sold. “It was a wonderful place to be. Jack trained me in the world of scholarly books.” Benton stayed there for a year.

His first rep job was with Viking/Penguin. As the Chicago-based rep, Benton covered Illinois, Iowa, Indiana, Kentucky, Missouri and Wisconsin and met his next mentor, buyer Daniel Goldin, while calling on him at the Harry Schwartz Bookstores in Milwaukee, Wis. “Daniel walked me through the entire process of selling books to him,” Benton recalls, “and we bonded over that.”

Benton thrives on the smart energy of emerging booksellers “who know what they're doing.” One such account is the Bookworm of Edwards, in Colorado. Benton cites owner Nicole Magistro as an example of a great bookseller. “They're smart, curious and opinionated—and fun, too. Having strong, thoughtful opinions is especially important, because it's the starting point of the discussion,” says Benton. “At the same time, buyers have to be open to new ideas and information. Ideally, the process is a give-and-take.”

Baseballs and Galleys

The trunk of Benton's company car reveals his priorities: his children's baseball gear rests atop boxes of galleys, catalogues and order forms. On the way to Los Angeles's Vroman's, Benton muses on the impact of a bad economy on his booksellers. “They're definitely buying less up front. With the climate we're in, it's a matter of survival. Buyers have to be more cautious now.” Because of this, Benton contacts his accounts at once when a book is suddenly publicized to make sure they have enough stock on hand. “More than ever, reps and buyers have to be quick on their feet, reacting to what's happening in the marketplace,” he notes. The extra marketing push is expected these days. Last Christmas, Penguin came up with the “What to Give, What to Get” promotion from their top authors, each recommending the books they'd most like to receive as holiday gifts and those they'd most likely be giving. The rest was left up to the reps. “I worked with the buyers to make the poster or easel back that would fit best with their holiday displays,” Benton says. “The ease of the promotion made it effective for the stores during the busiest time of the year.”

Benton becomes so animated while discussing The Help, Kathryn Stockett's new novel from Penguin (Feb.), that it's easy to see why his buyers are so fond of him. “It's a classic example of what can happen when reps pull together behind a book,” he says. “It's a novel about the South, written by a Southern author, but we gave it a big push to the marketing group and got them to extend Stockett's tour to the West. Now she's doing events from San Diego up to San Francisco.”

At Eso Won Books in Los Angeles, owner James Fugate sings Benton's praises. “Tom really knows books, and I mean the entire catalogue. I've known him for over 10 years, and he's one of the most thorough reps ever. He goes to bat for bookstores, too. I asked him for Walter Mosley recently, and the next day Penguin called us with a date for a signing.”

Benton actively calls on bookstores in Southern California and Colorado, and shares Hawaii, Wyoming and southern Nevada with Penguin's telemarketing department. He sees between 40 and 50 accounts during each of Penguin's three seasons and, with a few exceptions, exclusively sells hardcover books. Right now he's coming to terms with the possibility that Penguin will drop its printed catalogues in favor of the Edelweiss program of online catalogues.

“I'm a dinosaur,” Benton moans. “I'm not on Facebook, and I'm always the last to give in to technology. But I can see how Edelweiss would be effective.” He's tested it a few times with accounts in Colorado and found his fears were for naught. “At Bookworm of Edwards, Nicole and I still worked side by side with our catalogues, but hers was on the computer screen. We didn't lose the rep-buyer connection, and it was much more natural than I thought it would be.”

Benton is passionate about his job. “The emotional connection people have with books clearly impacts our culture. I'm wired to be curious about everything, but especially what it is we're all reading. It makes me a better rep, and hopefully it gives me credibility.”

He has plenty on his sales plate as the adult hardcover rep for Penguin's three book divisions, a roster that exceeds 20 imprints, and says that he couldn't manage it without the help of his “dream boss,” national sales manager (adult hardcover) Diana Van Vleck. “Benton is definitely a rep that you can count on to produce consistently excellent work,” Van Vleck says. “He's organized, thorough and always on top of the myriad details that go on behind the scenes. I think the administrative detail is probably the most hated part of a rep's job, but it's what helps a rep become a better businessperson.”

Van Vleck hails Benton's willingness to go the extra mile for his stores, including speaking to members of a number of book groups at a recent Warwick's Book Group Night in La Jolla, Calif., introducing new authors to booksellers in conjunction with pre-publication tours, and tirelessly coordinating Penguin's books and authors during the annual L.A. Times Festival of Books.

Benton is aware of how the book business is remaking itself and is committed to playing an active role in the changes. “Things are changing much faster than I thought they would,” he says, referring to the growing popularity of e-books in particular. “People will always be hungry for stories. I think publishers will find their way through these complicated times as they always have, by concentrating on the books, the authors and the stories that readers have come to count on,” Benton says. “And I believe there's still a great future for the book as a physical object.”