Help my favorite indie bookseller move to a brick-and-mortar location!

[image description: The logo for indie bookstore Bookspace Columbus, which is the name “Bookspace” in all caps with “Columbus, OH, est. 2015” in a smaller font below. The writing is black on a white background.]

I don’t know exactly when during the year 2015 Bookspace Columbus opened for business, but I know when I moved to Columbus in November of that year it was one of the first indie bookstores I visited. At the time, Charlie, the one-man bookseller behind the shop, was set up in a coworking-type office space with limited hours.

Since then, he’s hopped around quite a bit. That’s historically been the business model: a traveling bookstore, like the bookstalls of Paris. Set up for a festival or a random sunny afternoon on a lawn somewhere or take over an indoor community space for a day. Over the years, I’ve bought books from Charlie in all these settings and I’m so much a regular at Bookspace that I keep a running tab. I’ve lost count of how many books Mr. Off the Beaten Shelf and I have bought from him, but it’s got to be damn near in the hundreds.

What I love about Bookspace is that it’s an abolitionist bookstore that also specializes in zines. Don’t get me wrong, Charlie can get any kind of book you want, but what he keeps in stock are largely social justice and history titles for a variety of ages. More often than not, he stocks books I’d never see or hear of otherwise, published by presses large and small. As I work to correct and unlearn all the messed-up ideologies of my upbringing, Charlie’s book selection has been instrumental to my journey. I am far less of an asshole now than I would be if I hadn’t been exposed to Charlie and the books he so thoughtfully curates.

While Columbus is rich in fantastic indie bookstores––like The Book Loft, Two Dollar Radio Headquarters, Prologue, and Gramercy Books––none are quite like Bookspace and none of the other bookstores I adore are in my neighborhood. They’re not a long trek, but they’re a 20-minute drive at a minimum. I’ve countless times wished that I could pick up one of these bookstores and plop it down in my neighborhood.

I don’t have to wish anymore. Charlie is moving Bookspace into the Flux + Flow dance studio in my neighborhood, so there will finally, at long last, be an independent, community-centric bookstore with new books (because there are two antiquarian booksellers in the neighborhood already) within a 5-minute drive. This is going to be an incredible resource for me and my whole community!

There’s just one challenge: Going from pop-up markets to a fixed brick-and-mortar business is not cheap. Charlie needs new tech (like a point-of-sale system/register), more shelving and displays for expanded inventory, new marketing materials (like bookmarks and flyers with the new address), the ability to have merch made, and more.

The transition is going to run about $15,000, which might sound like a lot if you’ve never run a business before, but I can tell you as an entrepreneur myself that that’s extremely reasonable. He’s doing a GoFundMe to raise the money and although he’s well on his way, Charlie needs help bringing this new, evolved version of Bookspace to life. If you can find it in your heart to support a bookseller’s dream (not to mention he’s just a damn good dude and friend!), I’d be ever so grateful.

And if you’d like to learn more about Charlie, I interviewed him a while back for the blog!