By Ben Cox
Jeff Meskill has now been a sales representative for Bound to Stay Bound Books for 13 years, and worked in the book business for 25 years before joining BTSB. Meskill covers a large territory spanning from Maryland to Maine, servicing hundreds of BTSB customers in his top states of Pennsylvania, Maryland and New York. He currently lives in Pennsylvania.
Meskill says he became aware of Bound to Stay Bound during his years in the book selling business, getting to know several of the company’s representatives at trade shows. In 2012, Meskill said he was looking to make a career change and reached out to a fellow sales representative who then put him in touch with Bob Sibert. A few visits to Jacksonville later and Meskill was on board. Our conversation picks up there:
Ben Cox: How was that first conversation with Mr. Sibert?
Jeff Meskill: It was great. He’s a fantastic guy. He’s an interesting man. We had a lot of similar interests outside of the book business. We both were into cycling and outdoor activities, so I really liked Bob when I first met him.
BC: As far as Bound To Stay Bound’s reach, not many folks here in Jacksonville, I think, realize how far the books here go and how big Bound To Stay Bound’s reputation is. So could you kind of talk about that a little bit? I mean, they really have a wide reach with people and schools and institutions that need books, and I don’t think folks around here know that. So if you could, offer some insight about that.
JM: It’s the book itself. It’s known to be the highest quality prebound library book out there, and it’s pretty. For instance, I was on a call yesterday and one of my customers was like, ‘Yeah, I only buy the Bound to Stay Bound books that are high circulating titles because they last forever.’ And they really do. So the reputation of the company within the school market and even in the public library market is that it is the most durable book available. So really I guess the company’s reputation over the last 105 years has always been really for producing a stellar product.
BC: What time of year do you typically see the most orders?
JM: That’s kind of interesting because every territory is a little bit different. Most of my customers in my territory, the librarians get their budgets at the beginning of July. They go by fiscal year beginning July 1, so they start ordering over the summer. I do have some that don’t order until the school year starts, but in my territory, most of them start ordering when they get their budget on July 1, so that’s where I see the largest volume of orders coming in.
BC: You mentioned you’ve been in the book business for a while now. How much has it changed as we’ve moved into the digital age as far as number of orders and volume?
JM: It has changed more in the high school and college libraries from print to digital, more so than the K-8 market. The K-8 market still highly depends on print. So I would say there’s a little bit of digital, but I think we thought when digital first came out that it was going to take over the book business, but that really hasn’t been the case, but it’s there now.
I will tell you this from my previous employer I had where we did have digital books, nobody really, the consumer loves an ebook to buy because it’s cheap, but the publishers, the distributors, the authors, they don’t make as much on the digital book as a print. So it’s great for customers, but it’s not really all that great for distributors, publishers and authors. They don’t make as much [money].
BC: As far as the future for you, is it at Bound To Stay Bound? It sounds like it is a fast paced environment, but also a smaller family environment. Is that what continues to keep you here and retains you as an employee, the family atmosphere?
JM: That was the most important thing I would want to talk to you about because it’s a very unique company in that regard. Not only does the company know me, obviously, but they also know my wife, they know my daughters, I know Bob’s family, I know Lori [Smith]’s family. It is a very unique company in that regard, and they’ve done some wonderful things for me. I’ll give you a couple of examples. They have a scholarship program for employees that have kids going off to college. So one employee’s child that’s going up to college can apply for this scholarship and it’s a pretty significant amount of money.
Both my daughters received that scholarship, which was absolutely fantastic, and that they’ve actually, both my daughters have actually gotten to know Lori a little bit and they actually have to keep in contact with her as far as providing their grades and things like that.
On a personal level, in the last 13 years that I’ve been here, both my parents got sick and eventually passed away. And how the company treated me during that process was very touching. They were family first and it was just very important to them that I focused on my family at those times. So yes, the family atmosphere is what makes Bound To Stay Bound unique to me and unique as a company. And really, I think if you were to talk to Lori about the average age of a sales rep or the average time here, they’re all here. They all retire from here because it’s a wonderful environment. It’s a wonderful company, it’s a great product. So yeah, I don’t know if that kind of gives you a little bit more insight into the family thing, but I think it’s great. I think it’s a great family environment.
