If you've seen You've Got Mail, you know just how hard it is for independent bookstores when their corporate rivals come to town. Due to increasing competition with mass sellers like Amazon, brick-and-mortar stores are forced to rely on their loyal customer base—but the COVID-19 pandemic has made it even harder for them.
The iconic Strand Bookstore, a fixture in Greenwich Village since 1927, is the single remaining establishment out of 48 different bookstores that once spanned the entirety of Book Row.
Sadly, due to a lack of foot traffic, proprietor Nancy Bass Wyden was struggling to keep doors open.
Wyden, the granddaughter of the store's original owner, pleaded with her customer base for help. "I'm going to pull out all the stops to keep sharing our mutual love of the printed word," she tweeted. "but for the first time in the Strand's 93-year history, we need to mobilize the community to buy from us so we can keep our doors open until there's a vaccine.
Strand's clientele heard Wyden's pleas. Over the weekend, an influx of 25,000 orders crashed the store's website, bringing in approximately $200,000 in sales.
"How can I not love my book community for helping like this?" Wyden said later in an interview with the Washington Post.