Arlington Bookstore One More Page Needs Your Help

THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU! You wonderful folks have helped us meet our goal in just ONE week. We'll leave the page up just a bit longer for anyone else who still wants to donate. To the over 400 people that supported us in the past week, we cannot thank you enough!

https://www.youtube.com/shorts/ZyjxftB_yW0

It's Eileen the (mostly) fearless leader of OMP, an indie bookstore in North Arlington/Falls Church. Thanks to our wonderfully supportive community, we've been here for over 12 years! We'd like to stay here for 12 more, but we're struggling with some financial issues.

The profit margin for small businesses is notoriously small, and over time, even new small expenses or slight revenue dips add up. To stay connected with you during the pandemic, we majorly ramped up our website capabilities which helped us serve you and keep the lights on. Those website enhancements and the staff to support them come with additional monthly costs. In 2022, we were hit with unexpected expenditures to repair the plumbing and AC in our unit. This year, about half of our ceiling lights need to be replaced (fortunately, in the meantime we have lots of windows). And, like all of you, our rent and other expenses continue to rise. We have been aggressively identifying places to cut expenses that we hope will have minimal impact on the service we provide you and on our staff.

Our goal is to provide a place for the community to come together to share a love of reading and books. We strive to be a place for discussion and exploration through author talks, book clubs and conversation. We are so proud of the work we’ve done in the Arlington and Falls Church communities these past dozen years, and we want nothing more than to continue. We love the opportunity to talk with you about books and promote other local businesses (via our SBS shopping passport). That's what we're about.

If we've ever helped you find the perfect book, hosted an event with your favorite author, or brightened your day with a chocolate bar or a kind word, we're asking you to consider donating to our campaign.

How can you help?

The best way to help is by donating to this campaign if you have the resources. If that isn’t an option for you, we welcome your support in any of these ways:

If you've read all of this - you're a determined and patient person who obviously enjoys reading. Thank you!

UPDATE!

After only 3 days we are more than halfway to our goal! We never could have anticipated the level of generosity from all of you - Thank you!