Kiss & Tale: A Romance Bookshop had its "slow burn opening" on October 10 and aims to fully open within the next month at 688 Haddon Ave., Collingswood, N.J. The Philadelphia Inquirer reported that owner Katie Cunningham was inspired to open the 600-square-foot store after seeing the success of the Ripped Bodice romance bookstore in Brooklyn, N.Y.
Although she was sure a romance bookshop would pop up soon after in the Philadelphia area, when it didn't, she decided to take the leap herself, choosing Collingswood for its charm as a "fun, little walking town."
"What's so amazing about romance is you can really tailor how you fall in love with a book and its characters in any way you want," she said. "It's kind of a choose-your-own-adventure, and I want to make sure I help you find that adventure."
The pink-walled shop, featuring a velvet lips-shaped chair, offers romance favorites like "enemies to lovers," "arranged marriage," and "monsters and aliens." Categories are labeled with a "hot pepper" system denoting a book's level of explicit content.
"I'm just a mom who loves romance so much, and wanted to create a community for other people who love romance as much as I do," Cunningham said, adding that her goal is to create an environment where customers feel accepted for their swoon-worthy, smutty interests. Her selection includes shelves dedicated to LGBTQIA+, local authors, and sports romance reads.
During the "slow burn opening," readers from North New Jersey to Delaware visited, and Cunningham's inventory of 1,000 books was halved by the end of the day, the Inquirer noted.
Since then, she's been re-stocking the bookcases to meet the demand of what she calls the area's "big, supportive romance community," which she described as "just the most accepting group of people, and I think [these books] are giving power back to readers over our bodies and understanding that liking different things is OK. As a woman raising a daughter, I think having these [taboo] things be more easy to talk about is only going to help girls and women love themselves more."