Greenlight blowing up!

As we might have expected, the more we have going on with Greenlight, the less time we have to blog about it. So, apologies for a couple of weeks without an update. Here are some of the highlights of the last couple of weeks, in no particular order:

* Greenlight is featured as one of four startup small businesses on AOL's new "online reality series" The Startup. The first installment is their summary of how we got here (and around lunchtime on Tuesday 8/19 our grinning faces were featured on the top newsfeed on the AOL home page, along with Shania Twain and Celine Dion!) We'll be blogging about issues of interest to the small business world (as opposed to the book world or Brooklyn): how we formed partnerships and found a space, setbacks we experienced, our marketing plan and financing and all of that. Yet another way to follow along with your local indie bookstore -- we're grateful that AOL approached us and looking forward to how the series plays out.

* The third installment in our architect Fred's renovation blog on Brownstoner went up: check it out for some insights on bookshelf design, and some interesting architectural jargon.

* We made some important aesthetic decisions: the exact shade of wood stain on the bookshelves (as noted on Facebook), the design of the cash desk and other architectural elements, the placement of speakers (for ambient music and events). Interior design is no joke, y'all -- making these decisions was often agonizing! But we're so happy with what we ultimately chose -- we think you'll like it.

* We're in the process of interviewing some of the top candidates for Greenlight Bookstore staff. This too, obviously, will be a tough decision -- all the more so because there are so many awesome, qualified book people to choose from! We're hoping to get a team in place in time to help with setting up the store before it opens, so we're on a fast track -- we'll hope to introduce our crackerjack booksellers to you once the roster is confirmed.

* We're working on pulling together our backlist orders: the bulk of the store's inventory of books. After some negotiations with the major wholesalers, we're placing our major initial order with Ingram. This involves looking carefully at around 24,000 lines of an Excel spreadsheet to make our best guess at the core books our store should stock (knowing full well this will begin to change and evolve immediately when the doors open). Some late nights and early mornings have been experienced.

* We've also continued to meet daily with publishers to order the frontlist titles for fall -- so much good stuff coming out this season!

* We ordered computers -- Jessica now has 9 large boxes from CDW sitting in her apartment, awaiting configuration.

* We bought some display tables. One is a former library table; one is an industrial sewing machine table topped with a church door. (That one took two trips.) We love them -- they go with our best of the old / best of the new / funky / welcoming Brooklyn vibe. These are now sitting in Rebecca's living room, and will hopefully soon be joined by others.

* We went to the New York Gift Show on Sunday (as many of our bookselling peers and other retailers will do this week), to find some great greeting cards, journals, kids toys, and other sidelines to round out the bookstore's offerings. We found some great products and beautiful designs, and experienced some surreality as well (watch out for the animatronic life-size orangutan, and stay far away from the realistically breathing stuffed cats.)

* It's been pointed out by some of our fans (hi Mom!) that we haven't posted a picture of the storefront since its total conversion to green. So, see below! You can also catch a glimpse of the small painting in tribute to Robert Fulton, to the left of the storefront above the pink-and-blue entrance to the apartment buildings above, and get a little bit of a feel for the stretch of Fulton Street where we'll be making our home.

Thanks for reading -- we'll keep on keeping you posted!

Early August Updates: Textures, Titles

The second in our architect Fred Tang's construction blog series on Brownstoner went up today! It's got some conceptual renderings of the plans for the space, which are pretty cool to look at.

Advice from experience, though: keep in mind that computer renderings are good for spatial orientation, NOT for getting the "feel" of what the bookstore will be like. They don't, for example, show much of the bookcases, or the display tables, or the textures of wood and paint, or the signage. I think we got a little hung up on this at first while planning, as we were imagining the store having the weightless, textureless feel of virtual reality -- but now that we're seeing the wood and sheetrock and drywall coming in to the store, it's easier to imagine the store as a physical, living place.

And if you're wondering about the status of construction itself, as Fred puts it: "Demolition is now complete and we're pausing for a moment while we wait for the NYC Dept. of Buildings to approve our construction application and grant us a permit." We've gotten quite a ways, and now we just have to sit tight for a bit and wait for the (good, kind, compassionate, tasteful) folks at the DOB to give us their final approval. We're still on track for our hoped-for opening in September, though -- we'll let you know when we can narrow down that window a little bit more.


In the meantime, I've been having almost daily meetings with publisher sales reps to buy the frontlist for the fall. (A bit of bookstore jargon: "backlist" signifies the books you keep on the shelves in the sections, that have been published already and stay in print. "Frontlist" includes all of the new books published this season -- the ones that get most of the media attention, and that you'll display in stacks or face-out until their moment has passed, or they become backlist.) We're doing our best to get in all the good stuff -- what we love and what we think our customers will love. It's a challenge, since we're new to the neighborhood and we don't have a sales history to show us buying patterns, so we're trying a broad range of things so that we have a chance to see what works.

And man oh man, is it a good fall for frontlist! So many amazing new books coming out, the other challenge is not breaking the bank with all the books we'd like to buy. In fact, there are so many big-name authors with books coming out this fall, we'd like to give you a chance to pre-order them. We'll be sending out an email soon with a few of our top picks for the fall, and giving you a chance to reserve one at Greenlight. Sign up for our mailing list, at right, to get the list. Hooray for exciting new books, and your own exciting new bookstore!