by Lília
Old Evergreens poster from 2012. Image taken from our archives.
Most of our customers know about our ABC Favorites, books we curate for their content as well as popularity. But why did we decide to have a whole section of Favorites? And how do we curate them? Who is responsible for choosing those titles?
Let’s dive into a little bit of ABC’s history: at some point around 2006, management decided we should do something to show our customers the books we, as stock buyers, thought were the most influential and the most interesting. And those our customers also loved the most. That’s when the idea of a selection called ‘Evergreens’ started to bud.
In the US, most bookstores have some room – sometimes a whole section! – dedicated to bestsellers. We didn’t want to go that way at the time. We wanted something a lot more personal, with ABC’s well-known Personal Touch. The idea took root and the Evergreens came to life mid-2007, after many talks to suppliers in order to get the books we wanted for a nice price.
The Evergreens were a success, but the idea of evergreens was too much of a North American concept and many Dutch customers would ask us “why Evergreens?” And we had to explain the whole idea of what an evergreen tree is and represents: always full of green leaves, always fresh and full of energy.
After a few years, we decided we should rebrand the Evergreens to a more familiar concept. What followed was a company-wide discussion on what we should rename them, and quite a few interesting options were pitched: ABC Classic, ABC Esteemed, ABC Essentials, ABC’s Dearest, ABC’s Best Loved, ABC’s Customer Choices, ABC Gem, ABC Choice Reads… and so on…
Our Favorites table in The Hague already includes the new titles.
There were so many to choose from! It was a good exercise in ideas and words. In the end, ABC Favorites won the ballot, and in 2013 the Evergreens became our ABC Favorites, with even bigger success.
So that’s the story of the name. But how do we decide which books to put on that list? We ask the people who read probably as much or even more than our customers: ourselves!
From time to time our colleague Jeroen sends an email letting us know it’s time to refresh the list, and asks us which titles we think should make the new one. Through this method – from books we loved, and realized our customers were also very much interested in – we have came up with titles such as The Courage to Be Disliked, Before the Coffee Gets Cold, Project Hail Mary, and many more. Of course, those titles are chosen not only because we like them, but also because our customers keep showing interest in them, thus making the ABC Favorites the real favorite titles from both buyers and customers. And though a few of the original Evergreens are still on the list to this day, some have been set aside as new titles were added. Like Sapiens, which was an ABC Favorite for around 10 years (!). This way we keep them fresh and interesting.
What do you think about our Favorites? Are there titles you’d like to see as a Favorite?
