I am that kind of people, who get a chance, eat up all the books in the world. SO, i was pretty excited about the 'world book fair in delhi. We, Wiley as exhibitors, had the time to spend in the sea of books...
Got to go only one day.... The fair was in Pragati maidan, Delhi as usual... traditionally the fairs like that happen in delhi only in prgati maidan... its built for events like that...
Wiley stall was small, smaller than i imagined... the competitors had all the attractive areas, so i was bit disappointed with the arrangement... Wiley was focussing on the test prep books - for IIT-JEE exams... so the authors for those books were to interact with ppl (we acted as dummies for the general public).... and later a mock test for high school students... Students in uniforms, coming in and writing exams, reminded me of the school days...
the authors came in to interact with them as well... that part was boring, since they kept repeating the same again and again...
Well, once the Wiley interactions were over, i hunted for some books... It was a shame i didnt get time to visit all other stalls... It was all spread out... and there was no order in the way the stalls were divided... Went around only one hall... bought some books...
To be around a sea books, i felt like heaven... Felt nostalgic when i visited the 'malayala manorama' stall... there was 'balarama', the comic i grew up reading... There was other malayalam stalls, didnt get time to visit them.... blame the length of pragati maidan....
But i appreciate the hard work of the organisers to keep conducting events like that... to give us a chance to buy books (especially the ones not available in normal book stalls) at a discounted rate... Speaking of discounts, there was something i disliked there in pragati maidan... it was the overpriced food in the food court... not just the food court, the ice-cream sellers on every corner -selling their products at three time the price on the packet!!! It was shocking... You buy books on discount - save that money and then spend that in food court... Something the organisers have to think about next time...
Anyway...i was an experience for me in the book fair... got to know our competitors better.... their strategy... Tips for Wiley to improve...
Looking forward to another book fair like this... :-)