It was upsetting to read about how a one-year-old small bookstore in Detroit had been scammed of $35,000 worth of academic textbooks from someone using stolen credit cards, with an out-of-state delivery address. 27th Letter Books racked up a ton of bills from these transactions that the banks would not honor.
The store owners said they are touched by their community’s support and more motivated than ever to keep their doors open.
“It’s wonderful that people are willing to pay it forward because of what they’ve seen us provide to the community,” Erin Pineda said. “It creates a beautiful reciprocity of gratitude between the people there in our neighborhood and us as a business, and a team of four people who care deeply about southwest Detroit.”
With the help of their community, 27th Letter Books was able to recoup its losses and remain open. The owners are implementing new procedures to prevent future fraudulent activity.
Beyond further securing their business and staving off scammers, the owners said they learned another valuable lesson.
“I would tell other small businesses not to be afraid to reach out to their community,” Cooper said. “They will fight for what they want and what they need.”
“If the community needs us here,” she added, “we’ll be here.”
Scams, scamming, scammers and being scammed are a way of life now. And people do fall for it. The con artist has been around since ancient times. It's how the world works. Are all of us trying to pull a scam job now and then, no matter how big or small? It's a shame, really. Is this how our society has evolved? Anyway.
My point is, we truly lack bookstores with a soul in Singapore. Bookstores have been meeting concrete walls in their bid to build a very strong community supporting them, not for the lack of trying though, but people just don't seem to care enough. When we have a fun bookstore with an independent spirit, the owner has questionable attitude, and finally got outed for exploitive behavior and misconduct with past and current staff.
As a start, bookstores have to sell books right? People don't buy enough hard copy books, and bookshops need to sell those and not digital copies or audiobooks. When we have space constraints at home, we turn to digital copies and other options. I don't even buy one physical book a month, not even over three months. I buy maybe two physical books a year. I read a large number of books annually; it's more practical buying digital copies or borrowing from the library. Our National Library does too-good a job in providing free books for residents.
Bookshops in Singapore face enormous business pressure to sustain operations and meet rental. Very few bookshops survive long in this city. You can discount Kinokuniya. It's a big name with sufficient capital, but it also struggles to stay afloat. I can't imagine the crazy rental paid to have a prime space in one of the most expensive malls on Orchard Road.
Many bookstores try to liven things up, to create a meaningful interaction beyond the physical bookshelves, and between the pages. People do go to the events and stuff, but those numbers are insufficient. There're events to create buzz and goodwill, and there're other events to push sales, which are imperative to the financial health of a business. Our bookstores hold ticketed events that aren't just book clubs or launches. They hold small art exhibitions, sell merchandise, host open mic nights, acoustic gigs, et cetera. They are community spaces, inclusive, opinionated and welcoming of diversity. We do support them. If only we have a larger pool of supporters.
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