Tuesday, August 15, 2017

HELP SAVE THE HARD TO FIND BOOKSHOP


Dear Reader, you’ve received this email because at some point you’ve interacted with the legendary Hard To Find (But Worth the Effort) Quality Secondhand Bookshop. We’re writing because we need your help... but first a few lines about us...

      The bookshop began as a hobby in a garage back in 1983, a real bookstore in 1984,  and found its present home in Onehunga, Auckland, New Zealand in 1988. It was founded on my passion and obsession for books of all kinds, and I believe we have created a store with an essence of magic, pleasure and surprise, a repository of learning, knowledge and entertainment. The books in the shop are complemented by the store itself - a several storey nineteenth century chaotic shambles of a timber building with well-worn wooden stairs and original wallpaper still hanging (just) from the walls. It is both a cultural icon and an economic anachronism with a unique bookish atmosphere available to all incomes and tastes.

        Many thousands of customers from around the world have visited as children, supplied themselves as students, and now bring their children to experience the piles of tumbling books and half-hidden treasures. Hundreds more people have worked short or long-term with us over the last 34 years and helped shape the shop as it now is.

       Unfortunately we are in crisis and this friendly dinosaur faces extinction... which is why this email has arrived in your inbox. The landlord hasn’t  maintained the building for the last twenty years and is now signalling a massive rent increase, one we won’t to be able to afford. Our only hope is to try and raise funds to buy the building and restore it to its glory, either fully funded or with a viable deposit. Despite working pretty much seven days a week I don’t own properties or have savings or bankable assets. The business has been a labour of love which pays our wages and continues to give a great many people of all ages pleasure, but there are no gold bars buried in the garden (we’ve looked).

     As the only resort i can think of we have come up with a crowdfunding campaign, and we are hoping you can help us by either preferably donating at the secure crowdfunding site: https://www.givealittle.co.nz/cause/hardtofindbookshop  or if that does not sit well with you, perhaps supporting us by purchasing some books from us online at our website www.hardtofind.co.nz

     Thanks for taking the time to read this letter.  Any help you can give us is greatly appreciated. Please do pass this email on to anyone you know who may be interested, particularly any philanthropic millionaires or billionaires.

      Regards, Warwick (the helmsman) and the team at Hard to Find Bookshop

Hard to Find Books
20 Dowling Street
Dunedin
00 64 3 471 8518

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