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2019 Bologna Children’s Book Fair Post Show Report Following, please find a general overview of the 2019 Bologna Children’s Book Fair (BCBF), in addition to comments from the show floor and Foreword’s Indie Press Collective. Many titles on display in our stand received attention from foreign publishers and agents. We will email you personally if more information about any of your titles was requested. We will also include a few tips on how you should respond if you are contacted by a rights agent. Part I: The Fair The Children’s Book Fair is an annual event at the Bologna Fiere Exhibition Center located just outside the city center. Nearby are some of the buildings of the University of Bologna, considered to be the oldest university in the Western world (eleventh century). This year’s fair was its 56th, taking place from the first through the fourth day of April (Monday through Thursday). Switzerland served as the fair’s Guest of Honor and the country’s official pavilion—“A Swiss ABC”—showcased the work of a prestigious group of twenty-six Swiss children’s book illustrators. An equally prestigious group of sponsors contributed to funding the country’s presence in Bologna during the Book Fair. The list included Pro Helvetia (The Swiss Arts Council), the city of Bern, the Michalski Foundation, the Swiss Publishers and Booksellers Association, the Else von Sick Foundation, and the Swiss General Consulate in Milan, which helped attract a number of private donors. Interestingly, Switzerland boasts four national languages—German, French, Italian, Romansh—young readers of each of those languages earn attention from the country’s book publishers. Held in conjunction with the Illustrators Fair, Digital Media Fair, and the Bologna Licensing Trade Fair, BCBF is far and away the most important international event for children’s publishing, attracting a variety of industry professionals including publishers, authors, illustrators, graphic designers, translators, literary agents, TV/film producers, licensees/licensors, printers, packagers, distributors, teachers, and librarians. This year, BCBF drew nearly 29,000 trade personnel (up from 27,642 in 2018), of which 12,000+ arrived from countries other than Italy. In another improvement over 2018, 1,440 companies from 80 countries maintained exhibit booths at the fair. While children’s book publishing reigns supreme during the BCBF, don’t overlook the significant trade in brands and licensing taking place at this year’s 12th edition of the Bologna Licensing Trade Fair. Warner Bros, Viacom, Pokemon, Disney, National Geographic, and Hasbro make their way to Bologna to wheel and deal intellectual property in the areas of entertainment, sports, and fashion. Think of everything from bedding and pajamas to party favors and broadcasting. In Italy alone, we’re talking 500 million-plus euros a year. The 2018 fair utilized six halls at Bologna’s heavily glassed, sprawling exhibit complex. This year’s fairgrounds were again dotted with towering cranes and the sounds of construction, confirming that Bologna was continuing to upgrade certain halls to keep pace with Parma and other trade fair complexes in Emilia Romagna. BCBF is favorably recognized for hosting hundreds of events in Bologna during the fair, in addition to dozens of educational seminars and workshops covering themes like African American culture, independent bookstores, nuances of the Chinese children’s book market, the resurgence of handwriting, children’s audio and digital books, and female representation in children’s books. Foreword’s Indie Press Collective was part of Children’s Books USA, located in Hall 26, the international hall where most US and English-speaking publishers are located. The setup routine of hanging signs and shelving books took us parts of three not-so-hectic days prior to the fair’s opening on Monday, April 1. Truth be told, our first visit to the fairgrounds each year features a healthy level of anxiety as we unload pallets and count boxes to assure everything has arrived. Then we take stock of the wall panels, tables, chairs, shelves, carpeting, fridge, and lights we pre-ordered. No, things are never in perfect order when we make landfall at BCBF but we’re always able to deal with the obstacles. This year was no exception. But when the show halls opened and the crowds filed in at 9:00 AM on Monday the 1st, the 2019 BCBF proceeded smoothly, although serious glitches with badge scanners bottlenecked many perturbed exhibitors at the front gates. It may come as no surprise to hear that most non-Italian visitors to the fair speak of Bologna as their favorite of all book shows. Foremost, credit the hundreds of high quality ristorantes, trattorias, osterias, drogherias, and pizzerias sprinkled around the city. Remember that Bologna is the capital of the agriculturally-blessed Emilia Romagna region of north-central Italy—think Parmigiana Reggiano, Parma prosciutto, Barilla pasta, Modena balsamic vinegars, Lambrusco, Sangiovese, and other top wine varieties—so its food scene is world renowned. In addition, Bologna is the home of Maserati, Lamborghini, Ducati, Ferrari (Modena), and other legendary automotive/motorcycle brands. Its rich agricultural and industrial history accounts for the city’s prosperity. Indeed, to walk the porticoed streets is to see some of Europe’s most beautiful buildings and architecture, much of it dating from medieval and Renaissance times. With so much to experience in the city, much of the business of book rights and licensing gets done after hours over Prosecco, spaghetti Bolognese, gelato, and nightcaps of grappa. Part II: Show Floor Buzz Like Frankfurt and other international book fairs, Bologna provides a much valued opportunity for old colleagues in the publishing industry to get together for intense thirty minute meetings. In fact, you’ll often see professionally dressed agents and publishers jogging down the aisles, hoping to make up a minute or two of lost time between appointments. That their conversations are about make-believe characters and talking animals adds a comic edge to the high-dollar business they’re conducting. Inside the 112 square meter Children’s Books USA stand, the Foreword Indie Press Collective held a prominent, highly visible position. Based on queries and conversations with minglers and appointment holders alike, the topics of interest centered around fun stories to read aloud to kids (that adults enjoy, too), books with extremely high quality illustrations, as well as topics like nature and the environment, animals, early learning, science and how-to, girl power, diversity, same-sex parenthood, community building, immigration, travel, and wordless books. As always, books with foil seals on the cover (reflecting awards) were a draw, as well as books in a series. The Chinese, especially, seem to seek out books with a moral lesson, and subjects like science, ecology, and travel. More than a few North American publishers asked about interesting, independently published books, in hopes of augmenting their lists and expand distribution opportunities. Part III: Foreword’s Indie Press Collective and Children’s Books USA Stand Located at booth number B92, in Hall 26, Children’s Books USA is a thirty-year-old Bologna Book Fair concierge and exhibit service for US publishers including Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, Eerdmans Books for Young Readers, Charlesbridge, Peachtree, Holiday House, Pixel+Ink, APA/Magination Press, RightsMix, and Fabled Films. The presence of these established houses, along with their rights people working through a long list of half-hour appointments, drove a significant amount of traffic into the Indie Collective’s vicinity. To that point, in an offhand comment during the fair, APA’s marketing guru, Jason Wells, praised the Children’s Books USA setup because he “wants to be where his competitors are.” HMH’s Candace Finn met with more than seventy different clients over the four days, in addition to a couple of appointments on the Sunday prior to the fair’s opening. Farah Gehy from Peachtree arrived with a calendar listing upwards of sixty appointments. In addition to hosting meetings in their booths, others, like Anita Eerdman, reserved several hours each day to scout for projects to acquire in the Italy/France/China/Japan/Argentina and other foreign halls. At any given time in our CBUSA booth, translators and illustrators will be offering their services or reconnecting with one of the US publisher reps. For an hour on Wednesday afternoon, Holiday House’s Grace Maccarone and Neal Porter hosted an open forum for freelance illustrators to show their work in breathless two-minute segments, and a dozen+ illustrators from around the world took advantage of the opportunity. As with any international book show, printers from China, Korea, India, and Turkey frequently stop by to chat about their companies and leave literature. The 2019 Foreword Indie Press Collective was hosted by Victoria Sutherland (publisher of Foreword Reviews) and me, her husband, the editor-in-chief of Foreword Reviews. Longtime agent Sylvia Hayse maintained a steady presence at a small table in front of the Foreword Collective, and over the course of the fair fielded dozens of inquiries related to books in the Collective. In addition, she hosted a couple dozen scheduled appointments with publishing professionals from China, Korea, Taiwan, Singapore, Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, Germany, the Netherlands, Italy, India, Malaysia, Turkey, the UK, and Spain. She made an interesting observation about how US sanctions have hit the pocketbooks of publishers from Russia, Turkey, and China (tariffs), and that the offers those publishers were making tended to be sharply lower than in years past. In the coming weeks, you may receive email notification about review copy requests from foreign publishers interested in exploring the first steps of publishing your titles in their respective countries. Please be prompt and only provide the materials that are requested. Most publishers and agents only want to see digital materials or a sales sheet/tip sheet at this point, so stay alert and refrain from automatically shipping them a book (save yourself the expense!) until they ask. Feel free to contact us with follow-up questions or details about the lead. Much of our business at the fair is in the form of walk-bys. To attract attention and traffic, we also gave away a couple hundred of the January/February and March/April 2019 issues of Foreword Reviews. Historically, many publishers are contacted directly after the fair through magazine leads or Foreword’s Online Rights Catalog. Be sure you have updated your book’s information. If your titles do not receive an initial request, please be patient. After twenty years of attending publishing trade fairs, we recognize that the international publishing community isn’t as keen on timeliness as publishers here in the States. Things that should take days often take weeks or months. Part IV: What’s Next As a courtesy, please let agents know if you are NOT interested or cannot pursue a contract due to prior obligations in that territory. If you don’t at least acknowledge the contact, it reflects negatively on all the publishers participating with Foreword’s collective stands. In your cover letter enclosed with whatever material was requested, explain that your book was shown to them by Sylvia Hayse or Victoria Sutherland at the Bologna Book Fair 2019, Stand B92 in Hall 26, in order to help refresh memories. At the end of the fair, your books (if they weren’t passed along to interested agents on the last day) were donated to schools from central Italy and Ireland. The gift of quality children’s books is greatly appreciated each year. For children’s book publishers of a certain size, the Bologna Children’s Book Fair is a must-do event. Smaller independent presses, in particular, have found the BCBF an excellent venue to begin a rights program. Compared to Frankfurt, the Bologna Fair is modestly sized and manageable. If you are only able to attend one international show overseas, Bologna may be a perfect fit. As the enthusiasm for children’s books continues to grow worldwide, we will also be participating with Children’s Books USA at the China Children’s Book Fair in Shanghai in November 2019. We’d be honored to help you present your titles to the global market in Shanghai. Please let us know if you have additional questions about participating. Ciao, Matt Sutherland, Editor in Chief Foreword Reviews Indie Press Collective www.forewordreviews.com 231-933-3699

Foreword’s booth at Bologna

2019 Bologna Children’s Book Fair

Post Show Report

Following, please find a general overview of the 2019 Bologna Children’s Book Fair (BCBF), in addition to comments from the show floor and Foreword’s Indie Press Collective. Many titles on display in our stand received attention from foreign publishers and agents. We will email you personally if more information about any of your titles was requested. We will also include a few tips on how you should respond if you are contacted by a rights agent.

Part I: The Fair

The Children’s Book Fair is an annual event at the Bologna Fiere Exhibition Center located just outside the city center. Nearby are some of the buildings of the University of Bologna, considered to be the oldest university in the Western world (eleventh century). This year’s fair was its 56th, taking place from the first through the fourth day of April (Monday through Thursday).

Switzerland served as the fair’s Guest of Honor and the country’s official pavilion—“A Swiss ABC”—showcased the work of a prestigious group of twenty-six Swiss children’s book illustrators. An equally prestigious group of sponsors contributed to funding the country’s presence in Bologna during the Book Fair. The list included Pro Helvetia (The Swiss Arts Council), the city of Bern, the Michalski Foundation, the Swiss Publishers and Booksellers Association, the Else von Sick Foundation, and the Swiss General Consulate in Milan, which helped attract a number of private donors. Interestingly, Switzerland boasts four national languages—German, French, Italian, Romansh—young readers of each of those languages earn attention from the country’s book publishers.

Scene from Bologna
Held in conjunction with the Illustrators Fair, Digital Media Fair, and the Bologna Licensing Trade Fair, BCBF is far and away the most important international event for children’s publishing, attracting a variety of industry professionals including publishers, authors, illustrators, graphic designers, translators, literary agents, TV/film producers, licensees/licensors, printers, packagers, distributors, teachers, and librarians. This year, BCBF drew nearly 29,000 trade personnel (up from 27,642 in 2018), of which 12,000+ arrived from countries other than Italy. In another improvement over 2018, 1,440 companies from 80 countries maintained exhibit booths at the fair.

While children’s book publishing reigns supreme during the BCBF, don’t overlook the significant trade in brands and licensing taking place at this year’s 12th edition of the Bologna Licensing Trade Fair. Warner Bros, Viacom, Pokemon, Disney, National Geographic, and Hasbro make their way to Bologna to wheel and deal intellectual property in the areas of entertainment, sports, and fashion. Think of everything from bedding and pajamas to party favors and broadcasting. In Italy alone, we’re talking 500 million-plus euros a year.

The 2018 fair utilized six halls at Bologna’s heavily glassed, sprawling exhibit complex. This year’s fairgrounds were again dotted with towering cranes and the sounds of construction, confirming that Bologna was continuing to upgrade certain halls to keep pace with Parma and other trade fair complexes in Emilia Romagna.

BCBF is favorably recognized for hosting hundreds of events in Bologna during the fair, in addition to dozens of educational seminars and workshops covering themes like African American culture, independent bookstores, nuances of the Chinese children’s book market, the resurgence of handwriting, children’s audio and digital books, and female representation in children’s books.

Foreword’s Indie Press Collective was part of Children’s Books USA, located in Hall 26, the international hall where most US and English-speaking publishers are located. The setup routine of hanging signs and shelving books took us parts of three not-so-hectic days prior to the fair’s opening on Monday, April 1. Truth be told, our first visit to the fairgrounds each year features a healthy level of anxiety as we unload pallets and count boxes to assure everything has arrived. Then we take stock of the wall panels, tables, chairs, shelves, carpeting, fridge, and lights we pre-ordered. No, things are never in perfect order when we make landfall at BCBF but we’re always able to deal with the obstacles. This year was no exception.

But when the show halls opened and the crowds filed in at 9:00 AM on Monday the 1st, the 2019 BCBF proceeded smoothly, although serious glitches with badge scanners bottlenecked many perturbed exhibitors at the front gates.

It may come as no surprise to hear that most non-Italian visitors to the fair speak of Bologna as their favorite of all book shows. Foremost, credit the hundreds of high quality ristorantes, trattorias, osterias, drogherias, and pizzerias sprinkled around the city. Remember that Bologna is the capital of the agriculturally-blessed Emilia Romagna region of north-central Italy—think Parmigiana Reggiano, Parma prosciutto, Barilla pasta, Modena balsamic vinegars, Lambrusco, Sangiovese, and other top wine varieties—so its food scene is world renowned. In addition, Bologna is the home of Maserati, Lamborghini, Ducati, Ferrari (Modena), and other legendary automotive/motorcycle brands. Its rich agricultural and industrial history accounts for the city’s prosperity. Indeed, to walk the porticoed streets is to see some of Europe’s most beautiful buildings and architecture, much of it dating from medieval and Renaissance times. With so much to experience in the city, much of the business of book rights and licensing gets done after hours over Prosecco, spaghetti Bolognese, gelato, and nightcaps of grappa.

Part II: Show Floor Buzz

Croatia booth

Netherlands booths

Like Frankfurt and other international book fairs, Bologna provides a much valued opportunity for old colleagues in the publishing industry to get together for intense thirty minute meetings. In fact, you’ll often see professionally dressed agents and publishers jogging down the aisles, hoping to make up a minute or two of lost time between appointments. That their conversations are about make-believe characters and talking animals adds a comic edge to the high-dollar business they’re conducting.

Inside the 112 square meter Children’s Books USA stand, the Foreword Indie Press Collective held a prominent, highly visible position. Based on queries and conversations with minglers and appointment holders alike, the topics of interest centered around fun stories to read aloud to kids (that adults enjoy, too), books with extremely high quality illustrations, as well as topics like nature and the environment, animals, early learning, science and how-to, girl power, diversity, same-sex parenthood, community building, immigration, travel, and wordless books.

As always, books with foil seals on the cover (reflecting awards) were a draw, as well as books in a series. The Chinese, especially, seem to seek out books with a moral lesson, and subjects like science, ecology, and travel. More than a few North American publishers asked about interesting, independently published books, in hopes of augmenting their lists and expand distribution opportunities.

close up of Foreword booth

Part III: Foreword’s Indie Press Collective and Children’s Books USA Stand

Located at booth number B92, in Hall 26, Children’s Books USA is a thirty-year-old Bologna Book Fair concierge and exhibit service for US publishers including Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, Eerdmans Books for Young Readers, Charlesbridge, Peachtree, Holiday House, Pixel+Ink, APA/Magination Press, RightsMix, and Fabled Films. The presence of these established houses, along with their rights people working through a long list of half-hour appointments, drove a significant amount of traffic into the Indie Collective’s vicinity. To that point, in an offhand comment during the fair, APA’s marketing guru, Jason Wells, praised the Children’s Books USA setup because he “wants to be where his competitors are.”

HMH’s Candace Finn met with more than seventy different clients over the four days, in addition to a couple of appointments on the Sunday prior to the fair’s opening. Farah Gehy from Peachtree arrived with a calendar listing upwards of sixty appointments. In addition to hosting meetings in their booths, others, like Anita Eerdman, reserved several hours each day to scout for projects to acquire in the Italy/France/China/Japan/Argentina and other foreign halls. At any given time in our CBUSA booth, translators and illustrators will be offering their services or reconnecting with one of the US publisher reps.

For an hour on Wednesday afternoon, Holiday House’s Grace Maccarone and Neal Porter hosted an open forum for freelance illustrators to show their work in breathless two-minute segments, and a dozen+ illustrators from around the world took advantage of the opportunity. As with any international book show, printers from China, Korea, India, and Turkey frequently stop by to chat about their companies and leave literature.

The 2019 Foreword Indie Press Collective was hosted by Victoria Sutherland (publisher of Foreword Reviews) and me, her husband, the editor-in-chief of Foreword Reviews. Longtime agent Sylvia Hayse maintained a steady presence at a small table in front of the Foreword Collective, and over the course of the fair fielded dozens of inquiries related to books in the Collective. In addition, she hosted a couple dozen scheduled appointments with publishing professionals from China, Korea, Taiwan, Singapore, Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, Germany, the Netherlands, Italy, India, Malaysia, Turkey, the UK, and Spain. She made an interesting observation about how US sanctions have hit the pocketbooks of publishers from Russia, Turkey, and China (tariffs), and that the offers those publishers were making tended to be sharply lower than in years past.

In the coming weeks, you may receive email notification about review copy requests from foreign publishers interested in exploring the first steps of publishing your titles in their respective countries. Please be prompt and only provide the materials that are requested. Most publishers and agents only want to see digital materials or a sales sheet/tip sheet at this point, so stay alert and refrain from automatically shipping them a book (save yourself the expense!) until they ask. Feel free to contact us with follow-up questions or details about the lead.

Much of our business at the fair is in the form of walk-bys. To attract attention and traffic, we also gave away a couple hundred of the January/February and March/April 2019 issues of Foreword Reviews. Historically, many publishers are contacted directly after the fair through magazine leads or Foreword’s Online Rights Catalog. Be sure you have updated your book’s information.

If your titles do not receive an initial request, please be patient. After twenty years of attending publishing trade fairs, we recognize that the international publishing community isn’t as keen on timeliness as publishers here in the States. Things that should take days often take weeks or months.

Part IV: What’s Next

As a courtesy, please let agents know if you are NOT interested or cannot pursue a contract due to prior obligations in that territory. If you don’t at least acknowledge the contact, it reflects negatively on all the publishers participating with Foreword’s collective stands. In your cover letter enclosed with whatever material was requested, explain that your book was shown to them by Sylvia Hayse or Victoria Sutherland at the Bologna Book Fair 2019, Stand B92 in Hall 26, in order to help refresh memories.

At the end of the fair, your books (if they weren’t passed along to interested agents on the last day) were donated to schools from central Italy and Ireland. The gift of quality children’s books is greatly appreciated each year.

For children’s book publishers of a certain size, the Bologna Children’s Book Fair is a must-do event. Smaller independent presses, in particular, have found the BCBF an excellent venue to begin a rights program. Compared to Frankfurt, the Bologna Fair is modestly sized and manageable. If you are only able to attend one international show overseas, Bologna may be a perfect fit.

As the enthusiasm for children’s books continues to grow worldwide, we will also be participating with Children’s Books USA at the China Children’s Book Fair in Shanghai in November 2019. We’d be honored to help you present your titles to the global market in Shanghai. Please let us know if you have additional questions about participating.

Ciao,

Matt Sutherland, Editor in Chief
Foreword Reviews Indie Press Collective
www.forewordreviews.com
231-933-3699