By Isabella Senno
Independent bookstores have been part of Iowa City for decades, and on Saturday, it’s time to celebrate them on annual Independent Bookstore Day.
Some have worried that increasing competition from retail giants such as Amazon could drive bookstores out of business.
“Retail is changing dramatically because the delivery of goods has changed, so innovation is basically delivering our product better than we are,” said Peter Vanderhoef, the owner of Iowa Book, 8 S. Clinton St. “The average college bookstore sells 80 percent textbooks; they’re not going to have that to sell in the near future.”
However, the traditional book business still appears to be going strong. According to the American Booksellers Association, the number of independent bookstores has increased 30 percent since 2009, and as of 2016, there are 2,311 stores scattered across the nation. From data compiled by Nielsen early last year, these retailers are also the only channel to increase their share aside from online stores.
The independent bookstore has had to make some changes, but Jan Weissmiller, a co-owner of Prairie Lights, 15 S. Dubuque St., said the changes haven’t been as drastic as some may have predicted.
“Our café was one of our big innovations; the café is a significant part of our business, and it’s not books. We do discount more than we did at one time …” Weissmiller said. “We’ve obviously increased our reading series, it’s a lot bigger than it used to be, and that’s to maintain a constant flow of people in the store, and we’ve increased our children books section and our programming for kids. I think it’s a bookstore, it’s not a variety store.”
For Nialle Sylvan, the owner of Haunted Bookshop, 219 N. Gilbert St., one of the ways the independent bookstore has flourished is because of a give-and-take relationship with the local community.
“The importance of an independent bookstore in the community has everything to do with response time,” Sylvan said. “I can respond even faster [than big box stores]. If somebody says I want a historical fiction section, I can stay up late and pick a lot of historical fiction out of my fiction section, put a bookcase in a different room, stick labels on it, put the books on and have it ready for the next day.”
Overall, each independent bookstore can offer a unique experience to patrons, which may be why they’ve experienced this unexpected resurgence.
“They like having something that’s completely different for the reason that whenever the family comes to visit or a friend comes in from out of town they can say, ‘Hey, you’ve never seen anything like this,’ ” Sylvan said. “And they’ll take them to Prairie Lights, and they’ll take them to Iowa Book, and they’ll take them to my store, and they have never seen anything like this because this is the only place we exist.”
