[ShareTompkins] Community Buy-Out of Buffalo St. Books

Tue Feb 22 15:28:37 UTC 2011

Please send these messages to bobproehl at gmail.com and not to the whole human
services list serve.

On 2/22/11 9:51 AM, "Donald Austin" <austin at ithaca.edu> wrote:

> I could commit two shares.
> 
> Don Austin
> 
> On 2/21/2011 9:38 PM, Franci Saunders wrote:
>> Amen to all that! I can go a share as well. 
>> 
>>  
>> On Mon, Feb 21, 2011 at 7:14 PM, Amy Walton <alwalton23 at hotmail.com> wrote:
>>  
>>>  
>>> I would love to see this happen.  I'd be in for a share or two.
>>>  alwalton23 at hotmail.com 
>>> Amy Walton
>>>  
>>> 
>>> From: mberman116 at hotmail.com
>>> To: darasilvermanus at gmail.com; tc-hsc-l at cornell.edu;
>>> sharetompkins at lists.aktivix.org
>>> CC: bobproehl at gmail.com; village-plus-tree at ecovillage.ithaca.ny.us
>>> Subject: RE: Community Buy-Out of Buffalo St. Books
>>> Date: Mon, 21 Feb 2011 07:08:22 -0500
>>>  
>>> Great thinking. I would support for two shares.
>>> Monty Berman  mberman116 at hotmail.com
>>>  
>>>  
>>> 
>>> Date: Wed, 16 Feb 2011 16:26:15 -0500
>>> Subject: Community Buy-Out of Buffalo St. Books
>>> From: darasilvermanus at gmail.com
>>> To: tc-hsc-l at cornell.edu; sharetompkins at lists.aktivix.org
>>> CC: bobproehl at gmail.com
>>>  
>>>  Hey All,
>>>  I got this on facebook and and re-posting it here. PLEASE forward widely. 
>>>  
>>>  Send replies to bobproehl at gmail.com
>>>  
>>>  -Dara Silverman
>>>  ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>>  
>>>  I am an employee of Buffalo Street Books, having worked as outreach
>>> coordinator here for roughly the past year. The opinions expressed below are
>>> entirely mine and not those of the owner, other employees of Buffalo Street
>>> Books. 
>>>  Also, when I refer here to independent local bookstores, I am referring
>>> quite specifically to comprehensive new bookstores. This is in no way meant
>>> to denigrate the importance of any of the fantastic used bookstores in town,
>>> nor of Colophon Books or either of the on-campus bookstores.
>>>  What I am going to propose here is not a bailout.  The unfortunate truth is
>>> a bailout at this stage would be a temporary fix.  I am proposing that the
>>> community buy out the bookstore and run it on a cooperative model.
>>> Here we are at the wake. For the past few days, I have sat quietly by while
>>> people queue up to express their sympathies regarding the closing of Buffalo
>>> Street Books, announced last Thursday. There have been three prevalent lines
>>> of discussion, each one of which bears a bit of looking at.
>>> 1. What the hell happened?
>>> 2. This is a terrible loss for the city of Ithaca (or the variant, this is
>>> disgraceful for the city of Ithaca).
>>> 3. If Ithaca can¹t support a local independent bookstore, who can?
>>>  
>>> Yes, it is a terrible loss. But is it a quantifiable loss? It¹s not as if it
>>> will suddenly become impossible to buy books in Ithaca. No book that you
>>> could have gotten on our shelves will now become utterly inaccessible, I
>>> promise you.
>>> In addition to simply providing a excellent selection of books, a local
>>> independent bookstore provides the community with readings by local and
>>> national authors, facilitates reading groups that are open to the community,
>>> hosts benefits for worthy local agencies, provides performance and rehearsal
>>> space for local theater groups and sells books to local libraries and
>>> schools at deep discount or at cost. Perhaps most importantly, we provide a
>>> space in the center of the community where literary arts can flourish.
>>> Of course, none of these things bring in revenue, and all of them are a
>>> little tricky to put a price tag on. But I would submit that everyone who
>>> has ever bought a book in an independent bookstore has done just that. If
>>> you buy a $30 hardcover at an independent rather than at Barnes & Noble or
>>> Amazon, either of which might carry the same book at 50% off, you have said
>>> it is worth $15 to you to have all of the benefits of a local independent
>>> bookstore. If we imagine that Amazon is selling every book it has at an
>>> average of 20% off (this number drops precipitously if your interests stray
>>> from the mainstream), then by buying your books at a local independent, you
>>> are saying it is worth 20% of your book budget to have that independent
>>> there.
>>> Beyond the concrete, there is serendipity of place unique to a local
>>> bookstore. It¹s an environment where everything on the shelf has been hand
>>> selected by someone in the store, a member of the community. Any Borders
>>> will look like any other Borders, even if they go through the trouble of
>>> tacking on a local interest section. In a local independent bookstore, the
>>> whole store is a local interest section. Part of the magic of a local
>>> bookstore isn¹t finding what you came in for, but finding something you
>>> never knew existed in the first place. By providing a space for readers to
>>> meet authors, authors to meet authors, poets to meet playwrights and so on
>>> in endless combination, a local independent bookstore waters the seeds of
>>> talent within a literary arts community.
>>> Let¹s move back to question one, which will quickly bring us to question
>>> three and the variant of question two.
>>> What happened was that the business was losing money. Every year, something
>>> new got tried and every year, things worked out about the same. Gains in one
>>> area were barely enough to compensate for losses in another. And as will
>>> inevitably happen in a situation like this, the owner, who I have the utmost
>>> respect for, got tired of lifting the load by himself.
>>> Was it a poorly run business? Not at all. It was innovative and perceptive
>>> in a quickly changing market. There was a constant search for options that
>>> would save the store. A program was developed to sell books to students on
>>> both campuses that has been wildly successful. The store has managed to
>>> become an integral part of nearly every aspect of the local literary
>>> community, has established an online presence and has explored every
>>> possible solution that would have staved off the situation we find ourselves
>>> in now.
>>> Believe me when I tell you that the store was in an ideal spot to survive.
>>> Included in the options explored was the idea of converting the bookstore to
>>> a not-for-profit model.  This would mean the bookstore itself would run
>>> about the same, but the owner or our staff would run a constant capital
>>> campaign to make up the difference between sales and operating costs. This
>>> move would have been unprecedented, but it looked to be a long road ahead
>>> and one we were unlikely to reach the end of.
>>> The fact of it is, the market will not support a local independent bookstore
>>> in a town the size of Ithaca. It simply won¹t. It is easy enough to blame
>>> everyone who spends their money on Amazon or Barnes & Noble, who doesn¹t
>>> wear their Shop Local pin proudly, who got a Kindle for Christmas. But
>>> that¹s not the point. If you look at the terms of the market, it is
>>> inevitable that a local independent bookstore will fail in all but the
>>> largest markets. We can¹t sell you a bestseller for 45% off. We can¹t stock
>>> every title in print and some that aren¹t. And that¹s not going to change.
>>> The market has spoken and it has said, No, Ithaca does not get to have a
>>> local independent bookstore.
>>> But where is it written that the market dictates everything that goes on in
>>> our community? Why should it dictate? The thinking behind Local First at its
>>> heart asks the consumer to go against the natural drives of the market
>>> (where can I get it cheaper faster bigger) and to purchase in a way that
>>> supports less concrete advantages. In very few towns and cities has the
>>> Local First philosophy been taken more to heart. And still the market is
>>> squeezing local businesses out of our town.
>>> What is necessary in this case is for the community and its members to
>>> realize their power not as consumers, as players within the game of the
>>> market, but as a community. The market says an independent bookstore isn¹t
>>> possible in Ithaca. It¹s time for the community to have its say.
>>>  
>>> Ithaca, if you want to have a local independent bookstore, I¹ve got one for
>>> you. You¹ve just got to come get it.
>>> Understand I¹m not talking about a bailout. I¹m talking about a community
>>> buy out. At the end of this process, the participating community, and I¹m
>>> talking a cooperative of dozens if not hundreds, would own the bookstore
>>> outright.
>>> If you¹re still reading, please keep in mind all the numbers below are
>>> highly approximate. But they should get the idea across.
>>> It would take somewhere in the range of $200,000 to buy out the bookstore,
>>> including everything on the shelves. For a while, I thought the way to do
>>> this would be to find ten people who truly believe Ithaca should have an
>>> independent bookstore downtown who each have $20,000 to sink in. But let¹s
>>> face it, I don¹t know ten people who have a spare $20,000. But what if we
>>> think about it differently? What if that amount was split into shares of
>>> $250 a piece. I know quite a few people with $250 who truly believe Ithaca
>>> should have an independent bookstore. And that amount could buy them one of
>>> 800 initial shares in an organization that would buy out and then own the
>>> bookstore. If they¹ve got more, it could buy them a couple shares.
>>>  
>>> I also know a number of people who don¹t have a spare $250 but still believe
>>> Ithaca should have an independent bookstore. I¹ll get to those people in a
>>> minute.
>>> If it works, what does it look like? It looks an awful lot like a
>>> corporation, one that would elect a board of trustees and hire a CEO. Like a
>>> corporation, shareholders would have a stake and a vote in major decisions
>>> regarding the future of the bookstore,, and, obviously, would receive a
>>> discount on books.
>>>  
>>> Are you going to get that money back? No more than you¹re going to get your
>>> PBS pledge back. What you¹re doing with that money is helping to buy a
>>> present for your community. You¹re saying not just that Ithaca wants an
>>> independent bookstore, but that it truly deserves one and will do what it
>>> takes to have one. And when this happens, that bookstore won¹t belong to one
>>> person or a small group of business partners who have to share the heavy
>>> financial burden. It will belong to a community of member-owners, with each
>>> member lifting the weight they can.
>>> If it all works and Ithaca owns its own bookstore, what does year two look
>>> like? Or year five?
>>> Being approximate, let¹s say the bookstore, left to its own devices, faces
>>> an annual shortfall of $100,000 a year. This, incidentally, is fractional to
>>> what an organization like the Hangar Theatre would face if their only source
>>> of income were ticket sales and they had to pay all of their ushers. This is
>>> where the folks with more time than money become part of the project. About
>>> half the above figure can be accounted for in labor costs, just to staff the
>>> desk. That cost could be offset by a committed corps of volunteers, each of
>>> whom ³buy² a piece of ownership with their labor. A worker-owner would earn
>>> an equitable share of the store through his or her labor. Essentially, if
>>> each share is worth $250, a worker-owner could ³buy² a share with
>>> twenty-five hours of labor.
>>> Which leaves us with a $50,000 shortfall. Fundraising campaigns and member
>>> drives would have to be run periodically throughout the year, every year.
>>> This is a daunting amount of work, but within this model, instead of a
>>> single owner and his staff of ten trying to make this happen, it would be a
>>> community of worker- and member-owners.
>>> I¹m talking about a community buy out, and one that would need to get off
>>> the ground fast. If this bookstore closes, another one will not rise to take
>>> its place, I will practically guarantee it. The difference in start-up cost
>>> and effort between opening a new bookstore from scratch and buying out an
>>> existing bookstore is huge.
>>> And let me again stress, this is not a money-making opportunity. No savvy
>>> entrepreneur is going to exploit this newly created lack in the market
>>> because there is no lack in the market. The lack will lie in the community
>>> and it is in the community where it will be keenly felt.
>>> There are any number of adjustments and additions that can and should be
>>> made to this plan. I¹m just throwing sparks onto a fire that is otherwise
>>> dying out. If they catch, it will be entirely due to you.
>>> If you believe this city needs and deserves a local bookstore; if, like me,
>>> you are appalled at the idea of living in a city without one;   if you are
>>> ready to put your money and time where your mouth is; if you are ready for
>>> Ithaca to live up to its reputation rather than bask in it; if you are ready
>>> to be part of a community that decides for itself what it looks like, rather
>>> than allowing itself to be shaped by outside forces Š
>>> Š then let¹s give it a try.
>>> At this point, I¹m looking to gauge interest. And by interest, I mean
>>> willingness to commit financially. I¹m just a poor kid, but I¹m putting it
>>> out there right now that I¹m in for $1000. Four shares. It¹s what I can
>>> afford right now. There are 796 to go.
>>> Anyone interested in more information or in participating should please
>>> contact me at bobproehl at gmail.com.
>>>  
>>>  

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