Book fairs are for making contacts

Genre: Books and digital products for children and teens

Book fairs attended: New Delhi World Book Fair, Kolkata Book Fair, Kochi International Book Fair, and international book fairs in Bologna, Frankfurt, Urumqi and Shanghai.

Most important book fair: Bologna Children’s Book Fair for international rights sales and New Delhi World Book Fair for visibility in the market and actual money making.

Importance of book fairs: International book fairs are the only way of finding potential partners for international businesses. National book fairs are great for finding distribution and retail partners within India and for meeting schools who can be big customers.

Expectations from book fairs: Making and consolidating contacts. Business happens over a period of time.

On online vs offline book fairs: Thanks to email and various online meeting platforms, there was never a dearth of connections. What the book fairs made different was the personal connection. I personally prefer offline book fairs.

-Sayoni Basu, co-founder, Duckbill Books and Consultant editor with Penguin Random House on the Duckbill list