The line-ups may not have been quite as long, but the enthusiasm was still there at the Elora Festival’s annual paperback book sale.
The precursor to the annual book sale on May 5 and 6 featured racks and racks of books on display in a storage shed behind the Centre Wellington town hall in Elora.
Volunteer Jean Trask explained that every paperback book sells for 50 cents – and the books are all fiction.
She explained the sale started about three years ago because of the sheer number of paperbacks for sale at the main sale.
“We decided we’d try a pre-sale and it’s worked very well.”
While the sale may not have made an enormous amount of money, Trask said it has been enough to make the effort worthwhile.
“It’s becoming a tradition as well,” she said, basing that on the number of people waiting outside for the doors to open that day.
“It was nothing like the lineup at the big sale where there’s about 900 people waiting; there were half a dozen or so waiting.”
Quite a bit of work still goes into getting the sale ready.
Trask said the women in charge of the paperback pricing and sorting year round – fill flats with books.
“Generally, there’s about 100 flats of books – knowing we’re having this sale knowing we’re going to have this sale the last Saturday of every March.”
While there is an ongoing workload, Trask said it does not take a huge amount of separate time.
“It’s something they just work away at.”
She added that the book sale in May is one of the biggest fundraisers for the Elora Festival.
