Long-Term Booksellers:

Unsung Hero
Ron Thompson, manager of facilities
Westbury, New York

It’s Tuesday morning. Store mail day. The busiest day in our Westbury, NY, facility, and Ron Thompson begins to sweat.  It’s going to be an extremely heavy mail day and he just found out that the paychecks are running behind.  And, the process usually takes three hours to print and three hours to sort, in numerical order.

Ron wonders how it’s all going to get done. He calls on his 20+ years experience with the company (he started in 1990 as a mailroom clerk) to come up with solutions. After a five-minute talk with his mailroom supervisor and the staff, a game plan is devised and the busy work of accomplishing tasks and goals begins. It’s a long, hard day and everything gets done. Checks are printed, delivered to the stores and handed to booksellers — all thanks to Ron and his team.

Meeting tight schedules and overcoming obstacles are all in a day’s work for Ron, who, in addition to the Westbury store mail operation, also manages the Graphic Arts Department and the 70,000-square-foot office space, all while trying to keep the 300 Westbury booksellers satisfied and moving forward.

“In all my years with the company, I haven’t met a more dedicated bookseller than Ron Thompson,” says Mitchell Klipper, chief operating officer. “To me, he is one of the unsung heroes of the company. His dedication helps make sure more than 40,000 payroll checks get properly delivered every week, that thousands of signs are printed for our local store events, and that millions of copies of training materials are produced. All on time. He is extremely conscientious and knows the stores are his customers — and he takes care of them.”

Ron is a Barnes & Noble success story. After two years working in the mail room, the company promoted him to supervisor of the Mailroom, Print Shop and Shipping Departments. In 1996, he became manager of Facilities, and in 2003, the company expanded his responsibilities to include the Graphic Arts Department.

Ron credits his success to hard work, dedication and his previous experience working in a grocery store. “It was there I learned how to be helpful and deliver friendly customer service,” says Ron. Mastering those two qualities makes a world of difference.