Now Accepting Nominations for ABA’s Booksellers Advisory Council (BAC)

We are now opening nominations for twelve open spots on ABA’s Booksellers Advisory Council (BAC), which serves as a sounding board and advisory council on issues facing the bookselling community and ABA.

Booksellers are invited to nominate themselves.

Nominations are due by 11:59 pm ET on March 25, 2024 and will be reviewed that week by current BAC members and ABA staff who together will select twelve new members (one each from CALIBA, MPIBA, SIBA, NAIBA, and GLIBA, and two each from NEIBA, MIBA, and PNBA) to fill the empty seats.

The BAC serves an important role in ABA’s work. The BAC has also proven to be a pipeline to the ABA Board. Eleven current ABA Board members served on the BAC — Kelly Estep from Carmichael’s Books, Tegan Tigani from Queen Anne Book Company, Jenny Cohen from Waucoma Bookstore, Kathy Burnette from Brain Lair Books, Diane Capriola from Little Shop of Stories, Jeff Deutsch from Seminary Co-op and 57th St. Books, Holly Weinkauf from Red Balloon Books, Cynthia Compton from 4 Kids Books & Toys, Danny Caine from Raven Bookstore, Jake Cumsky-Whitlock from Solid State Books, and Jessica Stockton Bagnulo from Greenlight Books.  

BAC members provide feedback about ABA programs and services as they are being developed; offer suggestions to help ABA improve programs and services to better serve the bookselling communities; bring concerns of booksellers and bookstore owners to the ABA staff and Board; and generally assist ABA.

The BAC is looking for individuals who represent different diverse identities. ABA is looking to create a committee as a whole that is representative of different types of individual diversity, as well as diversity of region, store size, and format.

A candidate for the BAC committee:

• Is a full-time bookseller or bookstore owner at an ABA member bookstore (any format or model)
• Has not served on the BAC before
• Does not currently serve on the Diversity, Equity & Inclusion Committee (DEIC) or the ABA’s Children’s Advisory Council
• Is able to meet the time obligation (see below) and serve for two years

Nominees will be informed of final decisions by Monday, April 8, 2024. The first BAC meeting with new members will take place Wednesday, August 14, at 4:00 pm ET.

The BAC time commitment varies as outlined below:

• Input and/or participation in ABA’s Winter Institute and Children’s Institute (offering feedback on programming, and/or participating in a panel)
  • Comped in-person participation at Ci is determined annually based on the budget.
• Occasional attendance at prep or preview sessions for ABA programming with external speakers
• Occasional emails asking for feedback
• Four quarterly 60-minute Zoom meetings
• Potential in-person meeting once a year, in conjunction with a designated ABA event and paid for by ABA (when this occurs, it replaces one of the quarterly Zoom calls)

For more information about the committee, please reach out to bookseller committee members collectively or individually, or contact ABA staff committee members CEO Allison Hill or COO Joy Dallanegra-Sanger.