Synopsis
Trying to get bookstores to accept your book and give it shelf space is very time-consuming, difficult to achieve, and can become very costly for the self-publisher. Here are ten good reasons that a new self-publisher should AVOID spending valuable time and money trying to get their book into brick-and-mortar bookstores.

What You Will Learn
1. You will learn the main reasons that you should avoid selling your books to bookstores.
2. You will learn why most self-publishers will not make money selling through bookstores.
3. You will learn the two biggest reasons that bookstores don’t want to sell self-published books.

Introduction
Trying to get bookstores to accept your book and give it shelf space is very time-consuming, difficult to achieve, and can become very costly for the self-publisher. Most bookstores are not anxious to get your book. And to make matters worse, as a small independent publisher, or self-publisher, you would be at the complete mercy of the bookstores. They set all of the terms, whether you like them or not.

But even if you do everything they want, and spend lots of time and money in the process to get a bookstore to accept your book, and give it some self-space, there is no guarantee that they will sell your book.

Here are ten practical good reasons that a new self-publisher should avoid spending valuable time and money trying to get their book into brick-and-mortar bookstores:

Reason # 1. Bookstores Only Take Books That They Deem Will Sell More Than A Few Copies
They will almost never believe that a self-published book will sell more than a few copies. They know that small publishers don’t have the power, connections, budget, or time to execute a large and sophisticated marketing plan.

Reason # 2. Bookstores Will Typically Order Less Than 10 Copies
Even if they accept your book and agree to give it a few inches of shelf space, most bookstores will order less than ten copies at a time. Limited space in the stockroom is one reason. A second reason is that your book will only be given a short time to prove to the bookstore that the book will sell. If it doesn't sell, they will remove it from their shelf.

Reason # 3. Bookstores Only Accept Books That Can Be Returned
And they might return all of your books to you – and you must pay to get them back. Some big bookstore chains know that small publishers cannot afford to buy back the books. They will then offer to buy your books back for almost nothing, and then put your book on their discount table.

Reason # 4. Bookstores Expect The Publisher To Pay For Shipping Both Ways
This is a fact of life for the self-publisher that self-distributes. It's also time-consuming to package your books for shipping, and postage is expensive.

Reason # 5. Bookstores Sell Very Few Books Compared To The Online Retailers
This is especially true for self-publishers. Big-name well-established authors, and the biggest publishers, are the ones that get the best displays and locations in the bookstore.

Reason # 6. Bookstores Physically Do Not Have Enough Room To Stock All Titles
The small bookstores might stock 5,000 titles. The huge bookstores might stock 140,000 titles. Amazon stocks a few million titles. You will end up spending lots of time and money trying to get your book into bookstores, most of which simply do not have the physical space to store your book.

Reason # 7. Bookstores Will Force You To Take Back All Of The Damaged Copies
Your book will sit on the bookstore’s shelf, get handled, bent, banged-up, etc., and then the bookstore will force you to take them back, and expect you pay for the return shipping.

Reason # 8. Bookstores Have A Bias Against Self-Published Books For Two Big Reasons
a. The reputation of too many vanity presses and self-publishers producing low-quality, un-sellable, and un-marketable books.
b. Self-publishers typically lack the proper relationships with distributors,