No longer gasping for air, Seattle bookstores see resurgence in foot traffic

Independent bookstores are no longer dying. That’s the message from the American Booksellers Association this week.

They’re not exactly serious competition against mega-retailers such as Amazon, but the couple thousand that are out there are not only going strong, they’re growing. At least 60 new independent booksellers opened up in 2015 and sales are up by 10 percent.

Seattle’s indie bookstore institution, the Elliott Bay Book Company, is among these retailers.

Related: How online companies dupe customers into thinking they’re buying local

Shelly Wilhelm was visiting the famous store from Denver this week, where she manages another well-known indie book shop, The Bookies. She says she knows why sales are solid for books, at least in the digital market.

“I think people like holding a book and they like smelling a book, they like turning the pages, they like seeing the pictures,” she said. “People are using e-readers to travel and I think they’re using books to cuddle and snuggle and take to bed.”

And that’s how it’s been for the last six years. New stores keep opening, and new books keep hitting the old-growth cedar shelves at Elliott Bay books, where manager Tracy Taylor has been working for the last 26 years.

Taylor can look around the store’s Capitol Hill space and feel confident about finances. In 2010, when the store moved out of the old Pioneer Square location, that wasn’t the case.

“We really felt like we were gasping for air,” she said. “Amazon had come on to the market, e-readers were out there, and it was really a struggle. And we were hearing that with other bookstores across the country. We watched a lot of bookstores close up.”

Things were going downhill since 1995. But, right in line with indie bookstores all over the U.S., things are better now.

“There’s been a resurgence with the public in wanting local stores in their neighborhood,” Taylor said. “We have foot traffic. We have a lot going on at night in here. And so each year since we’ve moved, we’ve continued to see increases in our sales.”

Elliott Bay’s friendly competitor, Third Place Books, is opening up a third location soon: a 7,000 square foot space in Seattle’s Seward Park neighborhood.

That’s one more sign that – just like Shelly Wilhelm of Denver says – people seem to be snuggling and cuddling with those independently-sold books.

Sign up for breaking email alerts