Gathering Volumes: Gathering Differently During Social Distancing
“Improvise, Adapt, Overcome” is the unofficial slogan of the Marines. The Covid-19 pandemic is making most of us find relevance in these words as we cope with the new normal. Business owners have faced their own unique set of challenges in the last several months, all of which come down to a common goal – survive. Surviving means having to adapt to the new rules, improvise to stay relevant, and overcome to thrive and be profitable. Denise Phillips, the owner of the locally owned independent bookstore in Perrysburg, Gathering Volumes, is doing just that. In addition to selling books, Gathering Volumes has developed a strong sense of community, hosting many events over the years, including author visits, book clubs, crafts, and musicians. Covid-19 put a halt to holding these events in the store, but it is merely a pause. In the meantime, determined to still provide to the community, Denise is starting to host virtual events to keep people connected. Together with Social B. Creative, her next big virtual event is coming up on June 21 from 3pm-4pm. We recently chatted with Denise to discuss the challenges Covid-19 has posed for her business, how she’s overcome them, and the upcoming event.
How did the Covid-19 pandemic affect your business, and what has Gathering Volumes done to adapt to the mandates?
Obviously, we’re retail, so we were shut down initially. Luckily, we’re educational so we weren’t shut down completely. We get books for schools and did a virtual book fair. We also worked with Rossford Schools which gave a book to every student by an author that will be visiting the school next year. Also, our store already had a website in place which allowed us to pivot pretty easily where people could buy books we have in store and special orders (which is a big part of our business). If people don’t want to purchase online, we do allow for curbside pick-up as well.
We also wanted to make life easier for people, so one of the first things we did was put out a new offering of a care package where somebody could send themselves or a loved one a package. We have a google form embedded on our site that people can fill out to tailor the package to give us an idea of what that individual may like (or dislike.) Some people have just emailed or messaged us about those specifics. The form asks how many books you want to include, whether you care if they’re new or used, whether you want to pick the title or have us? There’s also add-ins to really complete the care package. We have chocolate bars, coffee, tea, mugs, stuffed animals, and puzzles. They can pick these or have us do the choosing. Some people want to really be surprised and give us their budget and have us surprise them. Our book clubs and other events were also something that previously we did in store and are now being done virtually.
With retail allowed to be back open, what are you having to do in this re-opening phase that differs from how you did things before?
Of course we all wear masks. We have a sneeze guard thanks to my handy husband. I’m a pretty personable person so normally when a customer comes in the door I walk up and ask them if they need help and now I have to tell myself, “No you can’t walk up anymore.” You have to be personable from a distance. We have what we call a quarantine table. Books are very tactile, and people pick them up and look at them. So, we have them put them on the table and we’ll leave it for a bit before we put it back. We also clean surfaces quite regularly. We’re still unable to take in any used books based on the updates we get from the state. The amount of people that we’re allowed to have in the store is based on square footage, so we decided to allow 5 in at a time.
What has it been like to work with Social B. Creative; what has been the most helpful about our work?
It’s been great! It’s all helpful. For me when I opened the store it became obvious very fast that marketing by far was the thing I knew the least about and was least capable of doing. So, it’s always good to get professional advice on stuff you don’t know about. I’ve tried my best, but it’s definitely not my background. I’m much happier researching and handling the books. And with the author event coming up, doing it virtually is very different and it’s time-consuming. So, was it worthwhile for us to spend the time on it? Shifting to being more of an online store, never did I realize how much time it would all take. For us, we want to spend our time selling books. But we love the author events, so having Social B. handling it allows us the time to sell books while enabling us to still be able to offer the author events virtually.
What are you most looking forward to about the upcoming Virtual Author’s Panel event that our two organizations are planning together?
Well of course I’m a total fangirl when it comes to authors. I just think what they do is amazing. I’m pretty excited because I’ll be in the chat, but I get to not worry about the technical side of things and the actual running of it so I can be more of a fangirl, which is nice for me and I can pay more attention to the conversation. Also, there’s people that want to write and I really hope this opens up options for people. You don’t have to follow the exact route someone else followed; you have a lot of options.
You can find details on the upcoming event: “Write on: A Q&A With 3 American Authors” on Gathering Volumes Facebook Page.
