Andy Budd has a good little post on the dark side of the publishing industry — yes, even having your cover turned out on the shelves costs money.

But, actually, some stores will put your book on display if they really like it. We know for a fact that Kuhaku was prominently and happily displayed at some of the store-front, prime-space "New Arrivals" desks. And lord knows we didn't pay a cent for that.

During my brief stint with home-spun distribution here in Tokyo, I know that having Kuhaku face-out kicked sales up a few notches. At many stores here I was also sure to include a "shelf talker" with the package. Compared to stores that wouldn't give us the cover-out luxury, sales were probably a good 30-40% less. More so without the shelf talker. And sales at Book 246 in Aoyama-1 Chome, which once gave us cover-out preference and now doesn't, have dropped precipitously.

So Mr. Budd is most definitely correct in advocating flipping those books you love to show their covers — chances are that's enough to shift the sales in a positive way.