Veteran booksellers wondering where the new generation of book retailers will come from might want to peek into a corner of a high school library in Wisconsin, where 20 students are running a bookstore.
"These kids are the future of independent bookselling," said Annis Williams, a reading specialist at Memorial High School in Eau Claire. "They are the next generation of independent booksellers." Williams and MHS librarian Pam Gardow are faculty advisers to the Memorial High School Bookstore, which has been in existence for the past year and is starting to make an impact on and off the 1,800-student campus.
The bookstore came about last year after Williams and Gardow formed a student club called the Teen Literacy Initiative. At first, the group sponsored a number of activities at the high school to promote reading. But the group's common interest in books inspired them to do more. They decided to start up a campus bookstore, selling books to MHS students, teachers and staff. The MHS Bookstore's inventory is small, but it can order any title from Baker & Taylor. Not surprisingly, YA titles and children's books sell best at MHS Bookstore.
"We started doing this not just to get students and staff to buy books from us," Gardow told PW. "We also wanted kids to get into the habit of picking up books. Some kids haven't ever checked out a book from the school library, and we want to make them comfortable about selecting and reading books. We are selling books that people otherwise might be buying from Amazon.com." Eau Claire, a city of 55,000 residents, has no independent bookstore; the local Borders Books & Music, however, has been very supportive of MHS Bookstore's efforts.
The student staff of MHS Bookstore organize various events to increase awareness of the importance of books in people's lives and to literally place books in students' hands. In celebration of Teen Read Week (October 19—25), the MHS Bookstore staff transformed the MHS Library into a coffeehouse. Students sipped hot drinks as they participated in a book exchange program created from used titles donated by parents, teachers and students. Nearly 900 students received books at the event. "The kids could not believe that they could actually take books away with them—for free! It was amazing to see the smiles on people's faces as they discussed and traded books," said Gardow.
The day PW spoke to Gardow, Williams and two students from the bookstore staff, the group was making last-minute preparations for a poetry slam later that day. Williams reported that 16 students were scheduled to participate in the poetry slam, before an expected audience of 300 students. "We've done this once before, and it went really well. We are expecting another great event, now that students get that poetry slams are a lot of fun," Williams declared.
The MHS Bookstore has started reaching out beyond the high school community to co-sponsor events with other organizations by making books available for sale. MHS Bookstore's staff sold books at the Eau Claire Public Library when popular YA author Chris Crutcher spoke there recently. The teen booksellers also made books available for sale when Michael Perry recently spoke at a local elementary school. "We want to forge partnerships with other schools and with the library—that's really important to us at this stage," said Gardow.
Visiting UMBA
In a measure of their seriousness about bookselling, tive student bookstore staff members, accompanied by Williams and Gardow, went to the Upper Midwest Booksellers Association annual trade show last month, where they attended educational sessions, met publishers, networked with other independent booksellers, talked authors into making appearances at their store and, of course, picked up galleys and finished copies.
"What an amazing adventure!" Gardow said. "We picked up some great marketing strategies at UMBA. We were absolutely reeling with new ideas, information and more questions. We are such a niche bookstore—we have to look at innovative ways to run our bookstore. UMBA was a treasure in terms of training and networking."
"I had a lot of fun at UMBA," said Alice Reid, an MHS senior and bookstore staff member. "Some people looked at us, and asked 'What are teenagers doing here?'—but when they talked with us, and found out what we are doing, they were really interested. I am excited about all the books and galleys I picked up. I think Old Turtle and the Broken Truth by Doug Wood [Scholastic] and Olive's Ocean by Kevin Henkes [HarperCollins/Greenwillow] will be hot titles in our store this fall."
After one year in business, Gardow said the store had netted several hundred dollars in profits. But, she emphasized, "any profits we make get funneled back into programs where the kids give books away—to elementary schools, to hospitals, and to shelters. We do not keep a cent. We are a nonprofit."
The MHS Bookstore plans to continue to expand its reach into the Eau Claire community. The staff wants to host more author events and to cater more to the literary needs of city residents, including college students at UW-Eau Claire. "It's a market waiting to happen. The time is ripe for something like this. We haven't done as much as we can do," Gardow said. "We want MHS Bookstore to be a community endeavor."
"People are so busy," added Williams. "It's hard to find time to just sit down and read. We just want to promote reading and to get people back into the habit of reading."
