Partner Spotlight: ZingTrain

Partner Spotlight is a new series designed to highlight the vendors that partner with ABA to offer discounted products, services, and business opportunities to ABA members. Each installment, we interview a different partner to learn more about their organization and why indie bookstores matter to them. 

Zingerman's Training (ZingTrain) offers in-person seminars, virtual workshops, and private trainings that share practical and proven tools to strengthen business systems and build healthy organizational culture. 

This week, Bookselling This Week spoke with ZingTrain Trainer Elnian Gilbert, who some ABA members may recognize from recent Institutes.

Bookselling This Week: Why don't you tell me a little bit about Zing Train?

Elnian Gilbert: ZingTrain is a training and consulting business. We were born out of the Zingerman's community of businesses, largely because people kept asking how we did things. How do you train your staff? How do you do such great customer service? How do you practice leadership?

We had our 30th anniversary this year. Maggie Bayless is the founding partner of ZingTrain. When she created ZingTrain, she was doing some work within Zingerman's and had the realization that these systems and tools that work for us would work for other people. So we teach people what we do. It is really rare that we teach content that is not born out of years and years — decades even — of practice.

We learn and improve along the way, but Zingerman’s is 11 businesses and 80 million in sales. We range from 700 employees year-round to 1,200 or 1,300 during the holiday season. So the systems we have work well, and we know they work for a lot of other kinds of businesses.

BTW: That's amazing. I know when I first heard of ZingTrain, I had no idea that it was connected to a larger family. So, some of our booksellers may not realize that as well.

ZingTrain has been partnering with ABA for several years, and you've come out to a lot of our Institutes. Is there anything you've noticed that may be unique or different about working with booksellers?

Elnian Gilbert: I'm a former bookseller, so that is always kind of fun. I'm also a huge reader. I haven't always been the one who gets to work with ABA. I always want to be, but I want to give other trainers the opportunity at the same time. [Wi2025] will be my third Winter Institute in a row, and I went to Children’s this year.

I would say one of the things that I have really noticed having worked with bookstores is that there is this idea that Amazon is putting bookstores out of business. And I think that's true to some degree, but it’s not a dying industry and there is so much hope. I've met people who have opened new bookstores and are thinking about retail in a different way. There's an optimism that I didn’t expect when I started attending these sessions. And I like working with booksellers because of how meaningful people find the work to be. I do a lot of work with libraries as well as bookstores — so people who like sharing information and connecting people with books and resources.

For libraries, the recognition that they're community centers, not just a place to get books, has been an evolution in the past ten years. But some of the bookstores, too, are very much that community meeting place. Not every bookstore is that or not every community needs that, but that’s something that people talking about — how important it is for them to be rooted in their community, representing their community, and welcoming for different facets of the community. It’s really great to hear all the thoughtfulness that's going into their work and their stores.

BTW: That’s a lovely answer. So, a lot of our booksellers have probably seen you at the Institutes. For those who may not have, is there something that you would say sets you apart from other training programs or resources?

Elnian Gilbert: To me, one of the big things that sets ZingTrain apart is that we are sharing our time-tested tools and systems. Zingerman's has been in business for over 40 years, and we do more than retail. We have wholesale production, we’re in multiple facets of the food industry. So, when we talk about our service approaches, it's not one size fits all, and it’s all based on practical working systems that people can take back and do.

One of the other things that really sets us apart is that we encourage adaptation. Just because it works this way for us does not mean it has to work exactly this way for you. There can still be value in attending a session, hearing something, and thinking “Well, it's not going to work as written for me, but it could work in this other way…”

Not everyone encourages adaptation, right? A lot of people say, “Well, you have to do it exactly this way or it's not correct.” That’s just not true for us. So that is a big difference. We're not the kind of people who are ever going to tell you what you should do. We never assume we know more than other people. The greatest joy in training is helping connect people with tools and resources that are going to make their work easier. So that mindset of “I want to help you” really comes through in our training. That is the Zingerman's or ZingTrain mindset.

BTW: I think everybody has been to at least one staff training in their career that didn't quite hit for them, and just sort of felt like you were being talked at. Having seen just a few of your sessions, they do feel very grounded and like you're leaving with tools you can actually use.

How about you personally? How long have you been with ZingTrain? Is there anything in particular that you love about working with them?

Elnian Gilbert: The beginning of October marks my 18th anniversary at Zingerman’s. I got hired as a temporary seasonal employee and there was no intention that I was going to stay here — either on my part or the part of the people who hired me. They were very explicit that my job wasn't going to last past the holiday season. And my hours did go down dramatically starting in January, but by that point I was really intrigued by what was Zingerman was doing.

Zingerman's is an Ann Arbor institution, right? It's a tourist attraction. And I'm from here, but I did not intend to stay in Ann Arbor. I was going to get a lot further away. I was not that familiar with Zingerman's, but they sucked me in — the commitment to training, the great service, the fact that I could do whatever it took to make it right for a customer who was unhappy — and I wanted to stay a part of this organization. And obviously I have.

 For 10 or 12 years, I've been a full-time trainer, and I get to travel around the country and internationally and share our approach to business with different people.

I also really like that I get to teach different content and that I work with different industries — both for profit and not for profit. There is a lot of crossover between different industries. If one thing works well in one industry, I know that I can share that with other people. It may not work in exactly the same way, but those ideas often translate. I get really interesting insights into industries that I would have had no exposure to otherwise! I'm a curious person, so whenever I go to any kind of industry conference, I want to attend the other sessions. I get to learn interesting things that I otherwise wouldn't.

BTW: You get to learn a little bit about every industry!

Elnian Gilbert: It's really fun. There are industries we work with more, like booksellers. I am the “dental specialist,” because I've done so much training with dentists, orthodontists, and oral surgeons. Or libraries! That’s in part because I love to read so much. Working with businesses and industries that I'm also passionate about makes it extra fun.

BTW: Do you have any book recommendations for us?

Elnian Gilbert: I really read a lot and I listen to a lot of audiobooks. Let's see…what have I read recently? I'm a big fan of Murderbot. It’s [by] Martha Wells and the first book is All Systems Red. It's science fiction, but it's just really irreverent. The main character is a security unit — it looks human, but isn't —and it hacked its governor module, so it's sentient, and shouldn't be. right? It likes to watch a lot of media, and thinks humans are kind of gross.

I'm also a big fan of mysteries that blend in humor. So India Holton is a favorite author, too. The Veronica Speedwell series is another one of my absolute favorites.