Our nonprofit launch: 2400 books and counting
Dear friends,
When I moved back home to Mississippi, my plan was to start a business. It's been three years since opening Friendly City Books, and in that time I've learned that this enterprise is more than a bookstore: It's an essential public service.
We're laying the groundwork to meet this need with a new initiative: a nonprofit. This year, we launched the Friendly City Books Community Connection with the generous support of an anonymous donor who recognized the impact a bookstore can have in a rural community. That gift has enabled us to do some amazing things.
We've donated over 2,400 books this year to local schools, students, libraries, and community members. Can you help us increase our reach with a donation to our nonprofit?
We've partnered with the CREATE Foundation, the community foundation serving Northeast Mississippi, to start a special project under their umbrella. They work with many charitable groups, so please use this link and make sure you designate the Friendly City Books Community Connection fund when you submit your donation so it goes to our account.
Our goal is to become an independent 501(c)3 in the next three years. To qualify, we'll need to demonstrate a broad base of financial support.
To thank you for helping us, you'll get a choose your own sale day at Friendly City Books!
After we confirm receipt of your contribution, we'll email you a voucher to use in store or for a custom order online. We'll even set you up with a bookseller to be your shopping concierge. It's a great way to take care of all your holiday gifts! The voucher will be good for a 20% off discount up to the amount you donated – or you can pay it forward and we'll donate it to a local teacher.
Click here to donate online through our fiscal sponsor.
We've been able to reach teachers at K-12 schools countywide with book donations, and they're making a bigger difference than you can imagine. All of our local public schools qualify for Title I, which means that more than 40% of students live in poverty, and in our municipal school district, every child is on free lunch. It was a huge deal when we were able to give a book to every first and second grader in our city schools when author Andy Harkness came to visit for his new book Wolfboy Is Scared.
We're also proud to support Mississippi University for Women here in Columbus with book donations. We've donated 200 copies of How the Word Is Passed by Clint Smith for participants in the Community Read, and we've surprised students in MUW's Gordy Honors College with copies of The Weeds by Welty Symposium keynote Katy Simpson Smith and The Comfort of Crows by guest speaker Margaret Renkl.
We've even put our bookstore dog Scarlet to work on the nonprofit. She's been a part of field trips, classroom visits, and the Mississippi Book Festival. All told, we've distributed over 600 copies of our picture book Stretch Like Scarlet to kids statewide this year.
There's more in store as we look ahead to 2024, and your support will help us expand our programming to launch writing workshops and new publications, as well as continue and improve our school outreach.
The first three years of Friendly City Books have only been possible because of you, whether you're one of our local customers or found us through Bookshop.org, or maybe you're an old colleague or classmate who's rooted for us from afar. I'm so excited about this new chapter for Friendly City Books, and I invite you to be a part of our future.
Happy reading,
Emily
P. S. You deserve a reward for reading the email this far! Donate to our nonprofit fund for a choose your own sale day. We've also got an extra special discount on some of our signed stock at friendlycitybooks.com/shop.