A Woman Dreams of Opening a Bookstore, and Defying the Trends

By SUSAN DOMINUS writing in the New York Times
Published: September 18, 2008

After Jessica Stockton Bagnulo, 29, graduated from New York University with an English degree in 2001, she did what she was supposed to do, which was land a coveted job as an editorial assistant at a major publishing house.

She cried every day.
It wasn’t that Ms. Stockton Bagnulo did not love books enough. She loved them too much. Writing book-jacket copy from a cubicle, sorting files, “I felt so far from the things we were making,” she recalled.

Longing for the part-time job she had in college, at Three Lives, an independent bookstore in the West Village, Ms. Stockton Bagnulo returned to working there on weekends to cheer herself up. At some point she realized that graduate school in creative writing was not the answer (which was good, because she didn’t get in anywhere). “Gradually,” she said, “it dawned on me that the big, important thing I wanted to do was open a bookstore.”

In the age of Amazon and sky-high New York rents, that’s the kind of dream that works if, like Sarah McNally, who opened the McNally Jackson bookstore in SoHo almost four years ago, your family owns a successful bookstore chain in Canada. Ms. Stockton Bagnulo had no such backup. “I have no money, no trust fund, no wealthy relatives,” she said. “I don’t know anyone wealthy.”
Even if she did, her entrepreneurial dream might not look like the best repository for an investment: since 2000, about 75 independent bookstores in and around New York have closed, according to Eileen Dengler, executive director of the New Atlantic Independent Booksellers Association, a trade group for the tristate area.

Ms. Stockton Bagnulo decided that none of that should stop her. She built up experience at various independent bookstores (including, currently, McNally Jackson, where she is the events coordinator). A resident of Park Slope, she took a class from the Brooklyn Economic Development Corporation. Researching business plans for bookstores at the Brooklyn Public Library, she noticed fliers for a Citibank-sponsored competition for business plans, entered it — along with 200 other dreamers — and won the $15,000 first prize.

Read this inspiring story in full at the NYT online.

Footnote:

The Bookman wishes her every success and is delighted to see that she has worked at two of his all-time favourite NY bookstores, Three Lives and McNally Jackson.