By Emily Espanol
As soon as you open the door, you feel the buzz of excitement vibrate the air. It rides on the warm hellos and the awkward small talk of your fellow vendors and organizers, as well as the whoosh of tablecloths as they are spread open and laid flat on tables.
Welcome to tabling season! Whether you’re at orientation, a conference, or a local farmer’s market, let me be the first to reassure you: You’ve made it to the right place! You belong here! Now, find your table assignment and settle down for a quick check in.
Brief Tabling Questionnaire
- Are you feeling nervous?
- A bit
- Absolutely
- I’M SHAKING
- Have you done this before?
- No.
- Yes, but every time feels like the first time.
- Yes, I should be teaching a class on this.
- How many hours of prep did you put into your tabling session?
- 4-8 hours
- 9-12 hours
- [enter response here]
- Not enough
- Did you bring a buddy?
- No – was I supposed to?
- Yes, but we’re still getting to know each other.
- Yes! They’re my bestie.
- Did you bring snacks?
- Yes, all my faves are with me!
- Yes, for myself and for my visitors.
- Oops, I forgot them in my car.
There are no right answers to this questionnaire. If you’re at the start of your tabling journey, I hope the questions give you something to consider as you plan your first tabling session. If you’re seasoned, I know you have experiences to share!
As a shiny new outreach librarian at a private university, I’m still getting my feet wet at table planning. In the last four months, I’ve tabled almost ten times for my library and for APALA! However, it’s not like I was a complete novice to start.
During my MLIS program, I was more than happy to volunteer in exchange for free admission to big ticket library conferences for organizations like the California Library Association and the American Library Association (ALA).
For volunteers, tabling should be easy. You just show up, learn a spiel, and repeat the spiel over and over until your shift ends and someone arrives to relieve you.
But the ease of being a volunteer comes at great expense for the planner. Among so many other competing priorities, planners must consider the following:
What are we bringing?
Buttons? Who’s making the buttons? Where were those files stored?
What’s our budget?
What snacks, and whose allergies or dietary restrictions can we respect with our budget?
Did you remember the table cloth?
Do we iron the table cloth or leave it be?
For everyone preparing to table for the first time, let’s talk through some best practices so you can take APALA to your next conference and confidently present our wonderful organization without all the first-timers’ headaches.
Best Practice: Consider whether the opportunity can advance APALA’s mission
When you see an opportunity to represent a small, social-justice oriented library organization like APALA, first ask whether the event will help advance our mission.
APALA Mission: APALA is a professional library organization dedicated to cultivating Asian Pacific American leadership through mentorship and professional engagement, advancing social justice, and providing opportunities for dialogue and networking to promote the needs of APA professionals and those who serve APA communities.
To simplify, consider the following questions:
- Are librarians the target audience for this event?
- If yes, that would advance the mission.
- If no, that would not advance the mission. APALA is a professional library organization advocating for the representation of and the development of leadership opportunities for Asian American, Native Hawaiian, and Pacific Islander (AANHPI) communities.
- Are books the main topic of this event?
- If yes, that could advance the mission. APALA’s presence would be providing opportunities for dialogue and networking to connect and represent AANHPI communities through literature and language.
- If no, the event might not help us advance the mission.
- Are there other diverse or AANHPI organizations or organizers at this event?
- If yes, that would advance the mission. Increasing awareness of APALA with community allies would help us promote AANPHI literature and language.
- If no, the event might not help us advance the mission.
If you can think of other ways an event could connect with APALA’s mission, talk to other APALA members for their perspective.
Best Practice: Reach out to your local APALA Chapter
If you’re still unsure that the tabling opportunity is fit for APALA’s presence, reach out to your local chapter for support. APALA Chapters provide the lowest barriers to enter the APALA community. Check whether you have an active chapter near you.
Planning any event is best performed in teams. Assemble yours and get help pulling together information about local AANHPI library activity and ideas for fun takeaways.
For example, at my latest APALA tabling event for the Colorado Association of Libraries, my regional chapter contact used the makerspace at her library to create buttons and pins with the APALA logo. I brought info sheets from the Media and Publicity Committee about the most recent Literature Awards Recipients. My table partner brought flyers for the Mid-Autumn Festival events at the library branches he served.
APALA’s community of AANHPI librarians are active and creative, offering incredible resources from communities in your region. Helping promote their work builds your knowledge about your peers while also advancing APALA’s mission.
Best Practice: Grab a buddy
Having a table buddy is crucial to maintaining energy at the event.
You will be talking non-stop, which means you should be drinking water.
If you are drinking water, you will be getting up.
Your buddy will be there to watch your table and speak with interested parties while you are gone or while you are engaging with another event attendee.
Your buddy will also help you manage your energy. Whether you are an introvert or an extrovert, you will get tired over time. Your buddy can help refill your cup with companionship or cover while you retreat under the table (happened to me once at the Zine Library at ALA Annual).
Bring a friend – preferably an APALA friend, but if you can get a willing IRL friend to memorize a spiel with you, bring them!
I have done events alone and with a buddy – the buddies always improve the experience!
Best Practice: Dress up your table!
Ideally, your table should serve as your conversation starter. People need a reason to talk to you, whether the reason lies in an attractive display, compelling information, a game, a giveaway, or a raffle.
The most awkward conversations begin when no one knows what you’re doing there. At my university, I recently tabled in the dorms with nothing but my branded table cloth, some candy, a standing flyer about an upcoming event, zines about the library, and colored pencils to decorate those zines. Do you know what students asked about the most?
The candy.
Can they have some?
Not the most compelling opening to a conversation, but an opening nevertheless!
Better conversations begin with a compelling topic or fact. Conversations around my table about Banned Books Week improved when I stopped begging for engagement and let my display speak for itself. People’s eyes tended to skip me and move straight to the ALA’s Censorship by the Numbers graphs. If they stopped or slowed, I would begin the spiel. Otherwise, I let them move on. Still, I counted every glance as raising awareness, and that’s value.
If you use games, they have to be short and/or collaborative. A prize wheel. A jeopardy board made of poster board and index cards. I’m still trying out my library-based Clue Game that features all the library’s service points, but it’s something!
You should also have something to give away – candy, (sustainable) swag, or handouts that are relevant to your audience.
At the Colorado Association of Libraries Annual Conference, for example, our handouts contained information about joining APALA as well as information about Mid-Autumn Festival events at libraries in the Denver metro area and information about our latest Literature Awards winners.
Beside our table, our friends from the Chinese American Library Association (CALA) offered authentic Chinese sweets from the Asian store. I took home a handful and tried offering them at the dorm at my university where I tabled, and they were the first candies to go!
Having materials centers APALA’s work and connects folks outside of the AANHPI community to our mission – the more people who know about our books, our sweets, our events, and our presence, the more those people will be able to bring others back to our diverse cultures.
As of this publication, the Media & Publicity Committee are trying to pull together a tabling kit with handouts. Check whether we have any resources for your next tabling event (fingers crossed!) by emailing communications@apalaweb.org.
Best Practice: Enjoy!
Lastly, don’t forget to enjoy the event! Take turns with your table buddy. Explore the grounds. You can visit other tables and spy innovations that you can bring to your next event. You can meet new connections and reengage old ones.
Once your event ends and the tables dissolve into tote bags and duffles, reflect on what about your table was most popular. The candy? The game? You and your spiel?
Do you feel ready to write your own “How to Table”?
Share your reflections and photos with us! We’d be so excited to feature your success in our community newsletter.