Once upon a time, I was dubbed ‘The Book Fair Lady’. I was an employee of Scholastic, the world’s largest publisher and distributor of children’s books.

This was my dream job. I was employed as a Book Fair Field Representative in 2010.  My kids were in middle school, so I pursued this position, allowing me to balance a part-time job and family around children’s books. What could be better?

I volunteered at the book fairs when my kids were in elementary school, so I was familiar with the Field Rep position, the paid position I was pursuing. After some research, interviews, and a bit of luck, I landed the job on my own when the previous rep retired. I was so proud of my accomplishment! 

I was trained quickly, had to set up a home office, and was now responsible for 150 school accounts in Northeast Ohio. My boss didn’t live in my state, but I had colleagues nearby in Cleveland. 

Celebrating the love of reading books in students’ schools was our marketing goal, but it was a serious sales job. Field Reps had to sell numerous fairs to each school and meet a revenue quota. 

We trained volunteers to maximize profit in their schools. We ran workshops. We were in constant communication with our schools during their book fairs. We met with superintendents, principals, school librarians, and PTO members to reiterate the importance of students purchasing books for their home libraries. 

Some volunteers asked for assistance with their fair setup, while other schools wanted financial and profit support after completing their fair. This job had lots of moving parts, and every day was different. But the job wasn’t perfect as I anticipated…

Looking back, those of us who worked part-time were way underpaid for requiring a bachelor’s degree to apply for the position. Our raise was often a quarter more per hour, per year. No lie. We had many accounts, and often worked off the clock to get the job done. We were intelligent women with ideas to increase revenue and market our products more effectively, but some management was dismissive. Our Christmas gift most years was a $5 gift card to McDonald’s, Subway, or a promotional Scholastic item. I’m serious. We were taken advantage of.

What turned my head the most was the Monday morning after the horrific Sandy Hook massacre. None of our management team addressed it during our weekly conference call. We were in schools practically every day. Most of us were moms. I brought it up. I thought this incident would change how we would do our jobs. We had no training on school shootings. That morning was the only time that Sandy Hook was ever mentioned again. My heart sank. It was more about the book profit than the kids we serviced and their own employees.

Despite the company’s shortcomings, I performed well at my job. I worked hard to win awards over the 9 years I was with the company. My biggest achievement was selling 48 new business opportunities and increasing fair sales by 24%. 

And there was certainly a plus to this position, my colleagues. Scholastic is where I met my best friend, Stacie. She was a Field Rep in Michigan. It’s amazing how close we were, and we only saw each other in person a couple of times a year. She passed away from breast cancer in 2024. I miss her every day. 

After all these years, my sweet friends, Gina and Kelly from Pennsylvania, and I still talk and get together. We are forever friends. I thank Scholastic for my friendships with these 3 incredible women. 

I am also thankful for the yearly kick-off conventions where we had training,  got to hang out with our colleagues, and had some fun. One year in particular, we were invited to celebrate the publication anniversary of the first Harry Potter book at Universal Studios, Florida. On July 13, Harry’s Birthday, I was with my crew, riding the newest ride, Escape From Gringotts. If you are a Potter fan, you can understand how cool an experience that was! 

In June 2019, the company absorbed the smaller markets, and my territory was integrated into larger cities in Ohio. I was devastated to lose my job. It was my last day of work before summer break, and the last thing I needed to do was wrap things up with a quick call from my supervisor. I was blind sided when I answered the phone with a chipper, “hello”, only to realize HR was also on a merged phone call. I never heard back from my supervisor again. There was no offering of support. Nothing. I wrote a letter to HR, thanking them for the experience. There was no exit interview, survey, or reply to my professional letter. To this date, it leaves a bad taste in my mouth.

My Scholastic coworkers started the next school year without me. Then COVID happened, and the world fell apart. Within the following 2 years, all the Field Rep positions across the US were eliminated. Today, the book fairs are run through a call center. There are no face-to-face meetings with the schools, no relationships formed, and no sharing of books. It’s so unfortunate. 

I still think about my years working for Scholastic. It gave me lifetime friends, confidence, a purpose, and I loved being surrounded every day by thoughts of Harry Potter, The Diary of a Whimpy Kid, Captain Underpants, Dog Man, and all the other famous characters that make kids excited to read. Lucky me. It was my ‘happily ever after’.