Building Shanghai Cultural Gold Character Signboard through Book Fair | Shanghai Book Fair | Public Culture | Full City | Gold Character Signboard

On August 16, 2023, the 19th Shanghai Book Fair arrived at the Shanghai Exhibition Hall in the same time and place as scheduled. Books are a collection of cultural and scientific knowledge, a carrier of historical memory inheritance and innovation, and a ladder for humanity to progress towards civilization. Culture is the soul of a city, and reading for all is the fundamental project for casting the soul of a city. The Shanghai Book Fair, which has been held continuously for nearly 20 years, has gradually established a mechanism of government support, market operation, and association participation. It has developed into a public cultural service platform for public reading, constructed a three-dimensional cultural field, created a reading atmosphere full of books, and displayed a good image of the city. With the proposal of the overall requirements for Shanghai's urban development, establishing the "Shanghai Culture" brand has become the main goal of urban cultural construction. The Shanghai Book Fair, as a "cultural business card," has become an important path to promote urban cultural construction and establish urban cultural brands.

1、 A blueprint, continuous efforts, and creating a new business card for urban culture

The Shanghai Book Fair began in 2004 and was an inevitable breakthrough in the traditional book distribution model at that time. Since the 1980s, under the tide of reform and opening up, the book distribution model of publishing houses only managing publishing and Xinhua Bookstore responsible for subscription and reimbursement has come to an end. In this context, local publishing houses in Shanghai attempted to run their own distribution and began holding Shanghai edition book ordering events in 1987. In June 2002, the Shanghai Book Ordering Fair was renamed the Shanghai Book Trading Fair and began to open to publishing houses in the Yangtze River Delta and other provinces and cities. But both the Shanghai edition book ordering fair and the Shanghai book trading fair are not open to readers, and their cultural influence is limited. Due to changes in the book market, the function of ordering meetings has gradually weakened and ultimately exited the historical stage. In response to the needs of the times, "book exhibitions" have begun to appear.

The book fair is directly aimed at readers, activating the enormous potential of publishing and reading through various cultural activities. The first Shanghai Book Fair in 2004 opened up retail to the public and organized more than 100 rich and colorful cultural activities, including discussions on the development of the book industry, book selection, new book releases, author meetings, signature book sales, etc., as well as imported books and printing equipment, book binding art, and classic version exhibitions. It built a platform for in-depth communication among writers, publishers, sellers, and readers. The construction of a "cultural metropolis" first requires the establishment of a mechanism for co construction and sharing of public cultural resources, so that the entire society can enjoy basic cultural products and services. The Shanghai Book Fair is a public welfare cultural activity aimed at the whole society. With low-priced tickets, special books, and various convenient measures, it provides equal opportunities for cultural enjoyment and exchange for the whole society.

In 2011, when the Shanghai Book Fair entered its eighth year, the organizers had changed from the Shanghai Municipal Bureau of Press and Publication to the General Administration of Press and Publication and the Shanghai Municipal People's Government. This meant that the Shanghai Book Fair became the fourth national level book fair after the National Book Fair, the National Book Order Fair, and the Beijing International Book Fair. Under the advocacy of the General Administration of Press and Publication, the nationwide reading activities with the slogan of "Bookish China" are flourishing throughout the country. Taking this as an opportunity, the Shanghai Book Fair has simultaneously established the "Bookish China" Shanghai Week, with the goal of creating an important brand and demonstration platform for national reading activities. It actively integrates the resources of Shanghai's national reading activities, and promotes the continuous formation of new hotspots and climaxes in national reading activities.

On the basis of ten years of accumulation, the 2014 Shanghai Book Fair first proposed a new purpose of "building a platform for value and paying tribute to quality". By creating a value and quality platform for publishing and reading, Shanghai Book Fair further realizes the transformation from sales services to reading promotion, striving to reflect professional quality in public services and meet the needs of the public in value guidance. The values and qualities embody the ideals of the organizers. In recent years, the Shanghai Book Fair has held various book recommendation and reading guide activities, striving to promote "quality reading" and expand the breadth and depth of "book fragrance filling the city". From the continuous adjustment and optimization of the exhibition ideas at the Shanghai Book Fair, we can see its sincerity and patience in promoting universal reading, as well as the city's faith and piety in reading. Since its establishment in 2004, the Shanghai Book Fair has grown into a city cultural business card, a citizen reading feast, and a national level demonstration platform for reading for all.

2、 Open innovation, bringing together China and the West, and building a new urban cultural dock

The Shanghai Book Fair showcases Shanghai's cultural confidence. Shanghai was once the birthplace and publishing center of China's modern and contemporary publishing industry, and now it also occupies an important position. The publishing industry is like a huge cultural "reservoir", which condenses the culture and spirit of a city. No matter how it is expressed, it can be precipitated in this "reservoir". Through books, newspapers and other publications, it integrates various cultural essence, and shows and retains the history, cultural essence, and urban spirit of a city. Therefore, the publishing industry has a profound connection with the cultural development of this city. It showcases the cultural heritage of Shanghai and is one of the important ways to spread Shanghai's urban culture.

To build Shanghai into a cultural metropolis, book exhibitions are an essential cultural element. The Shanghai Book Fair has been committed to becoming a national cultural event since its inception. Although the Shanghai Book Fair is held in Shanghai, the organizers have always emphasized that it is not a book fair in Shanghai, but a cultural platform created by Shanghai to serve the Yangtze River Delta and even the national publishing industry. "Based in Shanghai, serving the whole country" is the exhibition philosophy that Shanghai Book Fair has always adhered to. In 2008, the Shanghai Book Fair began to establish a guest of honor province, forming a new pattern of openness and cooperation towards the whole country. The Shanghai Book Fair showcases the city's vision with a service-oriented and inclusive attitude.

The book exhibition is the dock, and a thousand books set sail from then on. The Shanghai Book Fair launched the "Shanghai First Release, National Bestseller" campaign in 2008, and the "First Release Mechanism" became an important driving force for the Shanghai Book Fair to serve readers and the industry. After more than a decade of accumulation, more and more domestic big, famous, and strong societies are producing key books in August, using the Shanghai Book Fair as an important platform for new book releases. A good book fair, with a broad mindedness and ability to embrace all rivers, gathers books into an ocean and becomes a platform for publishing companies to release new books. The Shanghai Book Fair is promoting itself as a cultural hub for the first release of new books, with the aim of making Shanghai a popular destination nationwide.

Exciting and diverse, the book exhibition is a three-dimensional cultural field. The Shanghai Book Fair has always pursued the goal of being both market-oriented and above market oriented, as well as leading readers. Organizing high-quality and tasteful cultural activities has always been the unremitting pursuit of Shanghai Book Fair to radiate cultural influence. These activities with extremely high cultural connotations are directly aimed at citizens, effectively stimulating readers' "cultural excitement points", narrowing the distance between knowledge and the general public, promoting the leapfrog "growth" of the book fair itself, and emitting increasing heat year by year.

The Shanghai Book Fair utilizes the platform effect of "nationwide", "first release", and "everyone" to concentrate on launching high-quality works, highlighting the value of good books. If the Shanghai Book Fair is seen as a cultural symbol, it itself carries urban culture. The brighter the symbol, the more prominent the urban culture is. Its overall image can reflect the image of Shanghai city. The urban image is a concentrated reflection of the cultural connotation of the city, and the urban culture is the internal mechanism of the urban image, with an inseparable and inevitable connection between the two. As a cultural calling card of Shanghai, culture is its foundation, and book exhibitions are a three-dimensional cultural field.

3、 Book fragrance fills the city, brand linkage leads the new cultural landscape of the city

The fragrance of books fills the city, allowing reading to reach the depths of the city. Since its establishment in 2004, Shanghai Book Fair has always adhered to the cultural pursuit of creating the "most beautiful book fair" in China, focusing on providing high-quality public cultural services and a nationwide reading experience for book lovers. It has become a beautiful urban cultural business card. The Shanghai Book Fair has always been committed to promoting the concept of "reading is a way of life". In 2014, the Shanghai Book Fair collaborated with libraries, community cultural service centers, and rural libraries in 17 districts and counties across the city to jointly create the "Bookish Shanghai Reading Season" series of activities. From the "Seven Day Book Fair" to the "Annual Book Fragrance", the activity space of the Shanghai Book Fair is constantly expanding outward. To create a cultural atmosphere of nationwide reading in the city, it is necessary to radiate the activity resources gathered in the central venue to various districts and counties, allowing citizens to "turn the corner" and smell the fragrance of books. Various districts in Shanghai also organize reading activities of different levels and types based on their regional cultural characteristics, allowing the fragrance of books to permeate community cultural activity centers and rural libraries, and bringing excellent writers and works to ordinary citizens. Nowadays, Shanghai has formed a regional and central venue that is interconnected, with elite reading and mass reading echoing each other, and the cultural effect of book exhibitions spreading to the year-round bookish network.

Reading nourishes the temperament of a city. The key to the success of the Shanghai Book Fair lies in the city's favorable reading atmosphere. An exhibition and a city rely on each other, coexist and grow together. The development and growth of the Shanghai Book Fair cannot be separated from the rich soil of this city, and reading is nourishing the civilized temperament of this city. After nearly 20 years of careful construction, the Shanghai Book Fair has achieved significant comprehensive effects. The Shanghai Book Fair's large customer flow, multiple first launches, high sales, and celebrity effect have become the release site of annual new products in the industry and the gathering place for cultural figures. It has also promoted the transformation and improvement of related industries such as catering, tourism, and transportation to follow the pace of the Shanghai Book Fair. The spillover effect of the Shanghai Book Fair is reflected in many fields such as the brand effect of exhibition facilities, growth in tourism consumption demand, technological innovation and diffusion, enhancement of corporate and brand image, industrial adjustment and upgrading, interactive development of regional urban clusters, and infiltration of theme concepts. Compared to centralized exhibition halls, bookstores and shopping centers have a larger space and stronger scalability, making them high-quality "containers" to undertake the spillover effects of the Shanghai Book Fair. They leverage the linkage effect between book exhibitions, bookstores, and shopping malls, stimulate cultural consumption motivation, and make shopping centers a part of the city's reading space, helping to develop the city's cultural industry and improve the quality of citizen cultural consumption.

As a carrier and means of promoting urban culture, the Shanghai Book Fair also warms and serves the audience through many details, showcasing the image of the city. In terms of serving readers, every aspect of the book fair's operation showcases the spirit of "embroidery needles" in Shanghai's service as much as possible. For example, shopping guide, express delivery, deposit, medical aid, spray cooling and other measures more reflect the concept of convenience and benefit. These refined management reflect the high-quality and thoughtful exhibition culture of the Shanghai Book Fair, conveying the warmth of the connotation of Shanghai's international cultural metropolis. It is the process by which the dissemination subject continuously spreads Shanghai's urban culture and shapes its image to the dissemination audience through various channels and methods.

Facing the world, the Shanghai Book Fair is an international display of the city's good image. The Shanghai Book Fair has always regarded building a platform for cultural exchange between Chinese and foreign publishing and promoting Chinese culture to the world as an important exhibition goal. The internationalization of the Shanghai Book Fair can be regarded as a landmark element of the "Shanghai School Book Fair". The "Shanghai International Literature Week" and "Night of Poetry" shine with stars year after year, and are also international platforms for dialogue between Chinese and foreign writers, which are the units that many readers are most looking forward to. This is the cultural dissemination of Shanghai Book Fair from regional to international, showcasing the international influence of Shanghai's urban culture through various international cultural exchange activities and high-quality works of "coming in" and "sending out" to create an "international style" of Shanghai city. Every year's book fair is an excellent opportunity to showcase the image of Shanghai to the outside world. Through a series of exciting cultural exchange activities at the Shanghai Book Fair, the city's visibility and reputation are enhanced, and the audience's sense of identification with Shanghai culture is condensed and disseminated, showcasing the charm of the city's culture.

The Shanghai Book Fair is a witness to the development of urban culture. A vast collection of poetry and books embodies the lofty vision of a city. The extent of personal development space depends not on appearance, but on knowledge and wisdom; The strength of a city's influence is not judged by its high-rise buildings, but by its service level and cultural connotation. The Shanghai Book Fair is a cultural breath of the city, showcasing its unique cultural taste and spiritual heritage. As an important platform for promoting nationwide reading, the Shanghai Book Fair will play an irreplaceable role in moistening the general public, nourishing the urban context, accelerating the construction of an international cultural metropolis, and fully promoting the "Shanghai Culture" brand.