In East Sandwich, Mass., Titcomb's Bookshop reopened to the public on June 15 after being closed since March 23. Owner Vicky Titcomb reported that things are going well so far, with new manager Ellen Speers having overseen the reopening.
No more than eight customers are allowed in the bookshop at a time and, using money that they received from the Book Industry Charitable Foundation, Titcomb and Speers installed hand sanitizer stations throughout the store. They also ordered an acrylic barrier from Clear Solutions to help protect staff working behind the counter. The store is still offering curbside pickup for customers who would prefer not enter.
Titcomb noted that her store can feel like a maze, so allowing for social distancing has been a bit tricky. Speers and the bookstore team have removed the display tables around the front desk and, when the weather cooperates, they open the French doors at the front of the store to increase air circulation. The staff has set up tables with bestselling books under a tent outside the store, so customers can start browsing before they enter or have something to do while waiting for other customers to leave. Titcomb said she's experienced no difficulties with shoppers refusing to wear masks, whether they be locals or tourists.
One challenging aspect of the reopening, she said, is that the majority of her senior staff have not returned to working in-store due to health concerns. She added that like all booksellers that have managed to stay in business during the pandemic, she and her team "have been working to the point of exhaustion to turn our business on a dime" from a traditional browsing and handselling experience to an online business to a mixture of the two.
With in-person events canceled for the foreseeable future, Titcomb and her team are working on ways to connect to customers. These include more virtual events with authors around the world and sending out store newsletters with increased frequency. They are also adjusting the store's inventory to better suit their new customers, with more titles added in Titcomb's nonfiction, literary fiction, current events, romance and science fiction sections.
On the subject of the nationwide protests against systemic racism and police brutality that began in late May, Titcomb said the store has seen a huge increase in customers wanting to be more informed about race in the United States. As such, Titcomb's has greatly expanded its selection of books on race and racism, and created displays of those titles for adults and children.
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Karen Bakshoian, owner of Letterpress Books in Portland, Maine, said her store began offering browsing appointments on June 9. Within a week, due to customer demand and feeling comfortable enough to do so, Letterpress reopened for walk-in browsing. Initially Bakshoian and her staff, who are all family members, allowed only two customers in at a time, but now they've increased that to three.
There are now plexiglass shields around the cash wrap, distancing guidelines taped onto the floor and hand sanitizer available at the door. There's been almost no pushback against the store's mask requirements, with only a handful of people complaining so far. She added that her customers are "totally on board" with the requirements, even when they have to wait for 15 minutes or so for others to clear out.
"Our community has been really supportive throughout this crisis and we are so grateful," she said.
The good news, Bakshoian continued, is that the store is seeing increased sales despite being open shorter hours. Customers have told her they think the store must be doing well because people are reading more, but in fact regular customers have been making a noticeable effort to keep the place in business. They are buying stacks of books, gift cards for friends or themselves and care packages for relatives. Lately they've also been buying books to be donated to school libraries, particularly antiracist titles. On that note, she added, the store has made prominent displays of antiracist titles for both children and adults.
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| Cheryl Lee | |
44th & 3rd Booksellers in Atlanta, Ga., closed its location in the city's Little Five Points neighborhood in April. The decision, explained owner Cheryl Lee, was not because of the coronavirus pandemic but because the business went into negotiations for a new location in a different part of Atlanta, near the campuses of Morehouse and Spelman.
After protests began earlier in the summer, 44th & 3rd was featured on lists of Black-owned bookstores to support that were circulated widely on social media. The response, Lee reported, was amazing. Her store did not actually have an online sales platform until May, and it seemed like "as soon as our website was launched, orders started coming in and have not stopped." Needless to say, she and her staff have been very busy keeping up with demand but are "loving it. We are extremely excited that so many people are supporting our businesses and we hope that it continues."
Lee added that she and her team hope to open in the new location in October. --Alex Mutter