We're appealing to our community, the community that built this store, to help us bridge the gap to continue serving our neighbors.

After a tumultuous 2024, in November we were notified our lease was ending; as a result, we were able to relocate our shop to the Columbia Arts District. We're super excited to have found a place that will allow us to minimize our expenses, refocus our outreach efforts for the community, and continue to keep our beloved cats, Neil & Terry.

However, with the unfortunate unplanned timing of this move, we still find our shop at risk. Retail businesses, bookstores especially, receive the majority of their sales for the year during the holiday shopping season. By not being able to be operational during the holiday season, we lost over $20,000 in sales income. Similarly, the holiday season is a difficult time for mobilizing volunteers, so despite our large roster of community members that have participated in tasks throughout the year, the bulk of the move fell to just 2 people to coordinate, with sporadic help at random times. We have heavily felt the financial impact of losing the entire month of December and the first week of January while packing, cleaning, moving books and shelves, unpacking & arranging, and awaiting the return of our customers in the new space. While sales are starting to pick up in the new location and are demonstrating sustainability, we still have the loss of income with moving expenses on top of it to get ourselves out of. Deposits, storage units, truck/trailer usage, additional fueling trips, packaging & cleaning supplies have added up extremely quickly. We also hope to install a ramp at the front door of the space to have better accessibility for shoppers with limited mobility.

As a 501c3, we are able to offer a charitable donation deduction for folks who wish to offer support for some of our moving expenses. We are offering our popular Bookstore Bonds (a form of gift card) through our website at https://shop.ghostlightbooks.org/bookstorebonds. Any assistance is greatly appreciated!

Ghostlight Books is truly the bookstore that the community built. Born from a pivot from space rented for theatre rehearsals that was left in limbo during the pandemic, our shop started as the idea to have a book sale in an effort to raise funds for rent. In the preparations for the book sale, we reached out into the community for any opportunities to borrow tables or shelves and collect book donations. One of the very first contacts we received was from a family offering their entire library of books and shelves, and from that point, the bookstore was born. Since our opening day, November 21, 2020, our shop has operated with the mission of reinvesting funds into the shop and into arts opportunities for our community.

We're appealing to our community, the community that built this store, to help us bridge the gap to continue serving our neighbors. Thank you for your support over the last 5 years!