About Bookstores

Kate Bearce's Main Street Books is in Pella, Iowa, a town one hour from Des Moines, but steeped in the traditions of Holland. Founded by a descendant of an immigrant Dutch family, the store originally bore the name De Boekenader, a Dutch word for bookseller, said Bearce. In the early 1990s, the store was sold to two women who renamed it Main Street Books to reflect its address.

The village of New London, New Hampshire, can take some credit for the success of new U.S. Poet Laureate Donald Hall. The rural community of New London, especially the farm where generations of Hall's family have lived, has served as his lifelong inspiration and his home for the past 30 years. That same community is also home to 11-year-old Morgan Hill Bookstore.

Ann Burlingham is a small-town bookseller with big ideas. Her eponymous Burlingham Books opened on January 31 in Perry, New York, and celebrated its grand opening on June 17. Open seven days a week, and until 11:00 p.m. on Friday and Saturday nights, the store features live music and the only public changing table in town. And Burlingham has many more ideas about how to make the store a destination.

Outwrite Bookstore & Coffeehouse, a GLBT bookstore in Atlanta, was recently targeted by anti-gay protestors. On several consecutive Saturdays, approximately 20 protestors stood in front of the store carrying signs and a bullhorn. In response, a smaller counter-demonstration also gathered outside. Customers, neighboring businesses, and other community members have shown an "outpouring" of support, said Outwrite owner Philip Rafshoon.

Nearly a year after Hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans and the Gulf Coast, for many of the area's booksellers life is still far from normal, and each day comes with a sense of uncertainty. This week, and last week, BTW talked to several booksellers who are facing difficult decisions regarding their businesses and others, in sections of New Orleans not heavily damaged by the storm, who are back in business, with sales going well.

Maple Street Book Shop & Maple Street Children's in New Orleans

It has been nearly a year since Hurricane Katrina wreaked havoc in New Orleans and the Gulf Coast, and since that time, there have been countless stories detailing the storm's destruction and residents' frustration and despair, their struggles to rebuild, and their bravery and determination. Yet, little by little, the reports about Katrina's aftermath are declining in number as media attention centers on more immediate events.

Former Vice President Al Gore is in the middle of a campaign -- this time to promote the environmental message of his new book and documentary film, An Inconvenient Truth. And among his most recent stops were several independent bookstores -- Olsson's Books & Records Penn Quarter store in Washington, D.C.; Davis-Kidd Booksellers in Nashville, Tennessee; and Dutton's Beverly Hills Books in Beverly Hills.

At 6:00 p.m. on Saturday, June 24, Denver's Tattered Cover closed its Cherry Creek store and by Monday at 9:00 a.m., the new Tattered Cover at the historic Lowenstein Theater was fully stocked and open for business. More than 100,000 titles had been moved by staff and 300 volunteers to the transformed multilevel theater that still boasts balconies and an orchestra pit.

San Francisco's Books Inc. will be opening a new store in the location currently occupied by A Clean Well-Lighted Place for Books at Opera Plaza. Michael Tucker, president/CEO and co-owner of Books Inc., which has 10 locations, told BTW that he signed a lease on Tuesday morning, June 27, and hopes to open the store by mid-September.

Don Shaw, and his wife, Margo, the owners of Books Plus in Fernandina Beach, relocated to the Amelia Island community on the northeastern coast of Florida from the Boston area 10 years ago. The area annually welcomes thousands of retirees and others embracing a more relaxed lifestyle and year-round sunshine; however, the Shaws didn't want to slow down.

Collette Morgan of Minneapolis' Wild Rumpus is a master at creating authorless events that not only draw crowds, but that also ensure that her young customers continue to return to the store through high school and beyond. Morgan recently shared some of these memorable events at the ABA panel "Creating Killer Events" at BookExpo America. This week, BTW talks with the events guru herself about some of her store's unusual, crowd-pleasing activities.

As suburban sprawl threatens to overcome more and more communities, independent booksellers are facing battles on many fronts, from fighting proposed chain store developments in their communities to competing with online giants. It is a market landscape that is very familiar to Tom Campbell of Durham, North Carolina's The Regulator Bookshop.

For the owners of the 30-year-old Prairie Books & Gifts in Hastings, Nebraska, one can go home again. In 1983, owners Bernie and Jane Tushaus, moved their then seven-year-old store from downtown Hastings to the local mall. The general bookstore was located at the mall for 16 years until the Tushauses finally decided that enough was enough.