It's back! Book Expo America, the granddaddy of all book trade shows in the U.S., will be held in New York ate the Javits Center again in 2009...and in 2010, 2011, and 2012. It will also be shortened by one day, according to an article in Publishers Weekly.
That means, obviously, that plans to hold BEA in DC and Las Vegas have been postponed indefinitely. Well, okay. Makes sense to me. Many of the major publishing houses are based in New York, and it's far less expensive, and far less disruptive, for them to travel to the Javits Center than to go anywhere else. A New York-based trade show might not be nearly as much fun for a New Yorker as, say, a Las Vegas-based trade show...but that's the price we pay to economize.
I just heard from a HarperCollins author that the publisher has, in fact, downsized its staff. Is this the time to be planning a jaunt for the remaining staff members to a distant city in 2010? No, of course not. So, in that sense, it's good that BEA will remain in New York for the next few years.
On the other hand, I do look forward to a healthier economy that, one day, will allow publishers (and, not so coincidentally, book publicists) to write off trips to more exotic locations for BEAs of the future. Has anyone given any thought to holding BEA in Hawaii, I wonder?
