[EVG file photo of 136 E. Third St.]
St. Mark's Bookshop has signed the lease at 136 E. Third St. just west of Avenue A, The New York Times reports this evening.
The bookshop, which has struggled in recent years with the rents at its current Third Avenue home, expects to move this fall.
Details from the Times:
The new store will be half the size of the current one, but the rent of $6,000 is barely one-quarter of the $23,500 charged by their landlord on Third Avenue, the Cooper Union. The store has had support from writers and readers, and raised more than $40,000 on the crowd-funding site Indiegogo (the campaign continues through Friday). The new landlord is the city. The owners are exploring a transition to nonprofit status.
Back in November, Publishers Weekly reported that St. Mark's Bookshop had found a new retail space "in the East Village in a space near Avenue A and Third Street." We did a little guess-detective work and figured that the bookshop was moving to this space on East Third Street, where Landmark Bicycles was housed before moving to the northwest corner of East Third and Avenue A.
Jeremiah Moss was first to get confirmation of the move in March.
Finally some positive news amid all the closures.
15 comments:
Queue the "help fund our move" campaign...
I am so sick of crowd funders
I am so sick of high rents that mom and pop shops are forced to close or move.
Bookstores make the neighborhood safer, not bars.
The owners of that store are not too savvy. They have crowd funded 3 times and never ONCE showed a business model to anyone. They just wanted a bailout and not work for it. They could have moved anytime to a smaller space.
let's hope they get a clue how to run a business, train or fire their: manager or entire staff and start over. Free rent wouldn't keep a poorly run business open these days.
Trying to move to nonprofit status? Man, these guys are desperate and clueless.
I was just passing by here the other day and thought St. Marks Books and Bleecker Bobs should share this space. It's NYCHA property, so the rent is cheap. And chillmaster is down the block, so that's a plus, too.
Anonymous haters are going to hate. They have been operating the business since 1977, which is longer than 99.9 percent of the other businesses in the East Village. We should all be so clueless to be able to keep a book store (arguably the best in the city) going for 37 years.
Jacob. apparently their business model is out of date. Otherwise they would be profitable. Books aren't exactly in vogue these days. They didn't offer readings, discounts coffee like most bookstores do / and some libraries
Jacob, look at Detroit, you either up your game or you're finished playing. People expect friendly or at least attentive service when shopping small businesses not aloof and disinterested staff. With even the big corporate book stores closing shop and retail behemoths like Amazon eating up the lion's share a place like this has to work a lot harder to keep customers happy and coming back. I can only imagine the level of service a non-profit version of this company would create. I would prefer the new space they are renting to go to someone eager to open a business and is filled with ideas (not frozen yogurt) for a great and useful product or service. St. Marks bookstore has run its course and keeping it around another year or two will just prolong the inevitable. There are still good book stores in the neighborhood please patronize them instead.
Well, if you don’t like the store you shouldn’t shop there or contribute to its fund raising efforts. It’s fine if you do your reading via Amazon. Perhaps you would prefer another Starbucks or a CVS or bank--all of which have superior "business models." Many people, including me, don't think those outlets provide a comparable sense of community. Seems odd to heap scorn on any bookstore (whatever its problems), particularly one that's a neighborhood cultural institution.
Anonymous hater:
You sir, are truly a D bag.
Jacob- Apparently enough people didn't like St. Marks books enought to shop there otherwise they would stop begging for money to keep it open.
Maybe the reason people are contributing to keep it open is because they do like it. Still don't understand why this store upsets you so much? Do you have a personal beef with the owner?
OBVIOUSLY people are not shopping there otherwise they would be OK financially. I have an issue with surly sales clerks and that's who they employ. I have an issue with people begging for hand outs for 3 years. It's gross.
Post a Comment