On some days, we will get smaller donations than usual. It’s not uncommon to get several people in a row giving only a few coins for example. In such circumstances, some devotees tend to start taking the big books from people’s hands, giving them small books instead. This is a very bad practice which burns people away, especially when done in a blunt way.
HH Sivarama Swami: When distributing books, we should make as good an impression as possible on the people. They should think all devotees are saints. After buying books, they should be so inspired that they run home and immediately read what they’ve bought. Our books are about how people can change their lives by becoming Krsna conscious. Therefore sankirtana devotees must be prime examples of perfect people. This is preaching— preaching by words and by example. To do this nicely, rely on the Lord within, who will give you all intelligence.
When I met George Harrison, he said he had become interested in devotees because they were in the streets chanting and selling books under any condition—rain, snow, hot sunshine. He knew they could do this austerity only by getting a higher taste. Thus he respected devotees before he even met them.
Sankirtana can be done regularly only by devotees who are getting the blissful higher taste from their devotional practices and from the sankirtana itself. Both must be there. Preaching begins by giving people faith. And faith grows from an appreciation of Krsna consciousness. Therefore in our preaching, we must give people a favorable impression of us if we want them to read the books, chant Hare Krsna, and finally make a commitment to becoming devotees. Srila Prabhupada said, “We don’t want to irritate anyone, however. If he goes away by your aggressive tactics, then you are nonsense and it is your failure. Neither you could sell a book, neither he would remain. But if he buys a book, that is the real successful preaching.” (The Treasure of the Brhat-mrdanga, ch. 12)
One of our highest priorities on sankirtana is to be truthful. Srila Prabhupada once said that “our devotees should be adored by their honesty“. Whatever we say when distributing books, we need to honour. If we give a big book and say that we are not selling the book, only asking for spontaneous donations, then whatever the person offers, we need to accept. If people start to give very small donations, or if some start to take advantage, then we should change our tactic, but we can’t change the rules in the middle of the game and grab the book away, burning the person just because we are not happy with the amount given.
Our job is to do our best and leave the result up to Krsna. Even if someone gives a very small donation, still he is getting benefit, therefore we should not get upset. Just like in the story of the mendicant brahmachari who received a pile of ashes. This brahmachari was going out every day to collect alms, but the lady at a particular house would always refuse to give him anything. One day, the lady had a fight with her husband and was in a very bad mood. When the brahmacari knocked and asked for alms, she just filled his begging bowl with a pile of ashes from the fire. The brahmacari just smiled and said “Thank you!” in a cheerful mood. The lady got confused and asked why he didn’t get angry. The brahmacari answered: “So many times I came here and you never donated anything. Today you started the process of giving!”.
Even if someone gives a very small donation, still, by taking a book he gets benefited. This will add to his piety, which may allow him to give more in the future. By giving a small amount he started the process of giving.
Continuing, another big mistake is to use unfair sales techniques or cheating on our book distribution. This may increase the results in the short term, but it will have a lasting negative effect on the reputation of our whole movement and in our own spiritual advancement in the long run. Srila Prabhupada never approved the distribution through dishonest means.
“If we simply speak nicely to a person and try sincerely to get him to take the book he’ll take it. Why should we adopt unfair means? We should not do anything which will create a bad impression or make us unpopular. People are after these books, they are hankering for them. We don’t need to take cheating method. I never had to use any cheating method when I first began. I simply presented the real thing”. (Srila Prabhupada, letter to Ramesvara, 01 January 1975)
“The brahmamas are always truthful, even to their enemies. There is sufficient merit in our books that if you simply describe them sincerely to anyone, they will buy. That art you must develop, not art of lying. Convince them to give by your preaching the Absolute Truth, not by tricking, that is more mature stage of development of Krishna Consciousness. (Letter to Sri Govinda, 26 December 1972)
When we ask for donations, we can’t expect that everyone will give a sufficient amount for the book. As mentioned before, we don’t need that every single person gives a huge donation, we just need to keep an average. However, if you are consistently getting less than necessary, or if on a particular day everybody is giving small donations and you are getting in anxiety, you can change your strategy and start offering smaller books, suitable for the average amount you are receiving, and offering bigger books for a fixed price to favorable people or those who already took the small books. You can say, for example:
– We also have this one, the Bhagavad-Gita. This is a classic from eastern literature. It was written 5000 years ago and was studied by many great personalities, like Albert Einstein, Mahatma Gandhi, Tolstoy. It deals with practical problems that we face in life. This one is a little expensive to print, so we ask 20 for it.
In this case, the big book is offered as an extra, after you already concluded your initial presentation of the smaller book. According to their level of interest, a person may take only the small book, take only the big book, or take both.
There are many ways to help people to give more for a book. You can suggest an amount giving examples of classes of people, for example: “Usually businessmen give 50, housewives 20, students 10…”. I like to joke with high numbers: “Some people give two hundred, others three hundred… ” (then, when people make a scared face I tell that it’s a joke and ask them to just relax and give whatever they can). My experience is that by joking with big numbers, people tend to see what they are going to give in proportion with these big numbers and thus becoming more liberal in giving more. The main point to understand is that every person has a certain maximum amount that they are comfortable in giving, based on the value that they see in the book, their economic situation and so on. We want them to break with their miserly propensity to give just a few coins and come close to this maximum amount, but we don’t want to make them feel pressured to give more than they can, otherwise they will just give-up in taking the book, or even if they take, they will leave with a bad impression. Just like in many other areas in book distribution, this is a kind of art.
HG Navina Nirada Prabhu: “When I meet people and they ask how much, usually I just say, like in India, we say “one lakh or one chore”, and then we laugh and I say “I just give 100 rupees”. They always give the smallest amount. Or if I meet people from Brazil, I just say “cien reais” and they start laughing and they easily give you 10 or 20 dollars. So, it’s just a matter of pointing out the maximum and then, whatever smallest amount you quote, that’s the amount they really give easily. I also tell them “10 is average, 20 is generous, 50 is outrageous, and 108 is auspicious”, that also works.”
Sometimes, we can insist a little bit on the amount, after the person already donated, so he gets inspired to give a little more, but you can do that only if you are capable of presenting it in a very light and nice way, usually making some small joke.
If someone gives some derisive amount for a big book, I just politely ask if he’s really interested in the book, or if he’s really going to read it. In many cases, the person just admits that he doesn’t want the book and gives it back (as I pointed out previously, a very small donation usually means that the person actually doesn’t want the book and is not going to read it). At this point, I usually try to present a smaller book, seeing if it’s possible to make the person interested at least in the small one. In such cases (uninterested persons), you may also present a cookbook or some bridge-preaching book.
Instead of presenting only big books or only small books, you can start to present a set of three books of different sizes: one big or maha-big book, one medium and one small book, and let each person choose which one to take. Many are sensible and will take the small book when giving small donations, and others will just go for the small book because they are not so interested, creating a balance between the number of small and big books distributed, making it easy to make ends meet at the end of the day.
Of course, there will also be cases of persons giving very small donations and going for the big book, but at least part will take the small books, helping to improve your average. One tip in this regard is that people tend to take more frequently the book that you present first; so if you want to distribute more big books, present the big book first, and if you have more small books, present the small book first.
Naturally, there are also other ways. Instead of asking for donations, you can suggest a minimum amount. This is usually the best strategy when distributing big and maha-big books, since apart from the small donations problem, people tend to get insecure about how much to offer, a lot of times taking the easy route of just saying “no”. You can, for example, present a number of different big and maha-big books and then say:
– These books cost about 10 each to print; whatever you can give above that will be a donation.
In this case, you are giving an approximate value, which works as a minimum (since the person will automatically presume that he shouldn’t give less than the cost) but at the same time leaves the door open for generous persons to give more. The suggested amount can be a value a little over the BBT cost of the book, or close to the amount you need for the book (in case you need to collect a specific amount for each book, including the necessary profit for the temple), in both situations it’s ok, since in any case that’s the cost of the book for you.
Since you are saying “cost about 10”, not “it costs 10”, this is not a lie, you are just giving an approximation. It’s also important that it is a round number, don’t say something like “it costs about 13.60”, always use round numbers, like 10, 15, 20, 30 and so on.
The person then thinks: “Okay, they’ve spent about 10 to print this book. I can give 10 and only pay for the printing, or I can give a little more and assist them.” If the person doesn’t have at least 10, or doesn’t want to give 10, he will say: “I don’t have money”, “I don’t want”, “I’m not interested”, etc. and then, according to the case, you can either insist a little bit or just finish politely go to the next person. If he wants the book but has less than 10, you can still give the big book (and cover with a larger donation later) or offer a smaller book suitable to the amount, according to the circumstances.
Another positive point of that approach is that by specifying a minimum amount, you can present multiple big books to each person without being afraid of receiving small donations. Just do the best you can while presenting the books, and let each person see how many books they want. One may take just one book and give 10 or 20, another may take three or four books and give 50, for example. By doing that you can start to develop the ability to distribute multiple books to each person, which will increase your distribution tremendously. That is usually the secret of big book distributors, who can distribute 200, 300 or even 500 books in a day. Usually, there is a ceiling of around 100 people who take books in a day, no matter how expert or empowered one is (since we can only talk with a limited number of persons). By being able to distribute several books to each person, we create a multiplying effect. If 100 persons take sets of 3 books, you will end distributing 300 books in the day. If you somehow find a way to distribute sets of 5 books, you will end in the 500 mark!
The danger of trying to distribute multiple books to each person is that you can develop a pushy mentality, trying to force people to take more books than they want, which is naturally bad, not only annoying people who would be otherwise interested, but also affecting their notion of the value of our books. The difficult part about distributing sets is to be able to present the books in such a nice way that people are going to be attracted to the idea of taking multiple books themselves. In any case, it’s important to be sensible and learn how to understand people’s mentality and be able to correctly ascertain if there is the possibility of including more books in the deal, or if it’s better to settle on just one book. Many of the nicest people will only want to take one book, and it’s exactly because they see value in it. They like to take one book, give a nice donation for it, read, think about it, and then come back to take another one. In such cases, if we try to pile-up two, three, five books more, just because they gave a good donation, you are going to just blow up the whole thing. If you are getting more laksmi than you need, it’s better to reserve the surplus to be able to give free books to interested people than to try to force people to take more books than they want.
In any case, going back to the initial topic, don’t be afraid to ask the needed amount for the books. These books are valuable and the price we ask for them is very reasonable. Nowadays most people have spare money and use it to buy all kinds of meaningless things, from fashion clothes and accessories to hamburgers and ice-cream. If we can convince them to give a sufficient amount and take a set of books, this will bring great benefit both for them and for us. People are used to pay for different things, if we can make them a little bit interested, they will not mind donating for our cause. You just need to be a little bold and very determined.
“Go on spreading the sankirtana movement more and more. I am only one person, but because all of you have kindly cooperated with me, this movement has now become a success all over the world. Be assured that there is no more direct way to preach than to distribute Krsna conscious books. Whoever gets a book is benefitted. If he reads the book he is benefitted still more, or if he gives the book to someone else for reading, both he and the other person are benefited. Even if one does not read the book but simply holds it and sees it, he is benefitted. If he simply gives small donation towards the work of Krsna consciousness he is benefitted. And anyone who distributes these transcendental literatures, he is also benefited”. (Srila Prabhupada, letter to German Disciples, 6 May 1977)
In any case, we should keep in mind that everything that happens is under the control of Krsna, as He states in the Bhagavad-Gita: “Everyone follows My path in all respects, O son of Prtha”. Since everything is under Krsna’s control, we should not grieve in any circumstances, even if someone steals a book. In a class, HH Tamal Krsna Maharaja recollects that once a Godbrother confided to him that he actually stole his first book from a sankirtana devotee. He then added: “And I’m still working to pay for that book!”. Nobody can cheat Krsna, He always has some plan.
In one sense, we should be practical (and not sentimental), trying our best to present the books in nice and clever ways, to inspire confidence in people and make them give good donations, that can sustain our preaching efforts. On the other hand, we should keep in mind that even if someone gives a very small donation for a book or tries to cheat us in some way, still he is getting benefit for somehow getting in contact with spiritual knowledge, therefore we should just smile, just like the begging brahmacari who got a pile of ashes. We should keep in mind that Krsna is the biggest cheater, and anyone who tries to cheat Him ends up being cheated in the end, and that such cheating by Krsna is always for the person’s spiritual benefit. Maybe he will end up becoming a book distributor in his next life to pay for the books he stole this one… 🙂
When we are distributing books, we should maintain the mood of a giver. That should be our main priority: how to bring transcendental knowledge to people. Our meditation should be on how to make people interested and take books, and not just on how much laksmi we will have collected at the end of the day. When a book distributor has this mood of giving, people become attracted, touched. They see that here is a person who genuinely wants to give them something nice, and they become inclined to accept. On the other hand, if a book distributor has the mood of taking (or worse, the intention of taking advantage of people), they will notice, and react in a defensive or confrontational way.