About Bookstores

At the 62nd annual National Book Awards ceremony, held yesterday in New York City, stories of struggle were honored and the award winners, who included three women of color, gave voice to them. Also honored with lifetime achievement awards were Books & Books’ Mitchell Kaplan and poet John Ashbery.

 With the movement to pass a national sales tax fairness bill gaining momentum in Congress, BTW asked three booksellers who participated in ABA’s recent Sales Tax Fairness Advocacy Day in Washington, D.C., about their experiences and the importance of meeting with legislators.

Phoenix Books to open second location; Anderson’s gears up for Small Business Saturday; St. Louis indies hold book drive for the homeless; Here’s a Bookstore named “Best of”; Outwrite searches for new location; Parnassus opening draws media spotlight

Food for Thought and Bookshop Santa Cruz celebrate big anniversaries; Mystery Lovers aims to outfit a bookmobile; Changing Hands owner makes the case for shopping indie; Malibu welcomes back DIESEL; RiverRun garners community support; Strand owner talks to Marketplace

Thanks to close to 600 customers who pledged to buy five more books a year and a renegotiation of its lease, A Room of One’s Own ended its fiscal year in the black and with plans to expand.

The best approach to promoting e-books is multiple approaches — feature them in general and targeted electronic and print newsletters, advertise online and in-store, train staff, and “just be relentless”— is the collective opinion of booksellers who shared their best practices with BTW.

The Book Frog opens; HugoBooks to open fourth location; Grass Roots and Inkwood celebrate anniversaries; Pegasus in solidarity with the 99%; St. Mark’s wins rent concessions

Inspired by the Community Supported Agriculture movement, the owners of California’s Point Reyes Books have introduced a Community Supported Bookstore Program to help their business “navigate the crests and troughs of running a small retail operation” and to give customers a stake in its continuing success.

Last weekend, 350 middle school students and their parents connected with 13 authors at the inaugural Tweens Read Book Festival, organized by Houston librarians with help from Blue Willow Bookshop.

DIESEL reopens in Malibu; Brookline Booksmith turns 50