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Now, five years later, Glen is the owner of a successful Charlotte business: Shelves Bookstore, a pop-up that partners with independent stores to create gathering spaces for book lovers to shop, meet, and exchange ideas. Glen has settled into a community of local businesses, like Sunflower Family Restaurant, where the owners welcome her by name and save her favorite table, and Enderly Coffee (roasted in the region), where she works remotely.
This episode is with Abby Glen, the owner and founder of Shelves Bookstore. Shelves just celebrated their 2-year anniversary as an online and pop-up new book store. Shelves started as a pop-up store partnering with local coffee shops when COVID-19 hit. Abby quickly shifted to an online model and has now moved to offering both options to purchase books. Abby has wanted to open a bookstore for a long time but waited until she got out of debt first. In preparation, she did a lot of research online on how to run a bookstore, and started to reach out to local businesses to partner with her.
There was a time when Charlotte supported lots of bookstores, but nowadays the Queen City has only a handful of bookstores that are still in business. However, not all of the news is bad. Two years ago, Abbigail Glen launched a pop-up bookstore called Shelves, a black-owned business that is finding success by making books available where people already congregate.
Abbigail Glen’s plan was to start saving to open her own bookstore once she got out of debt. She resigned from her job as an HR professional to do just that, though it looked different than she imagined! We talk about how her pop-up bookstore came to be and what it has been like to be flexible in entrepreneurship. Abbi shares with us how her business fits in the context of her mental health journey.
Abbigail Glen is the owner of Shelves Bookstore, an online and pop-up bookstore. She says she’s grateful for Small Business Saturday, but thinks customers should support local stores year round
Shelves Bookstore. The mobile book store did pop-ups in coffee shops pre-Covid. But once in-person activities came to a halt, owner Abby Glen had to quickly improve her website and expand her online offerings. In the last few months she’s also added an audiobook subscription that functions similarly to Amazon’s audible for $14.99 a month (you get one book credit).
The Pop-Up: Shelves Bookstore Philadelphia native-turned-Charlottean Abbigail Glen introduced Shelves Bookstore in May after exploring ways to pursue entrepreneurship through literature. “Shelves is birthed from a love for books, love for camaraderie, and love for people,” she said about the mobile bookstore.
Abbigail, can you briefly walk us through your story – how you started and how you got to where you are today.
I have been talking and daydreaming about owning my own bookstore for the last 5+ years. I’ve always been an avid reader as a kid and still read tons of books till this day. I read 52 books in 2018. The plan was to start saving to open my own bookstore after I got out of debt. Well, I accomplished my goal of becoming debt-free and ended up resigning from my job as an HR professional with a small technology company based in Charlotte, NC shortly after that.
Monté & Toni are back for an all new season of the Outspoken Siblings Podcast! This week, Abbi, owner of SHELVES Bookstore, joins us to discuss her journey as a Black entrepreneur, sticking to her ‘why’, the importance of maximizing her gifts & more.
Join us diva’s and friends as we discuss the positive and negative critiques of Beyonce’s BLACK is KING. The irony in Orlando Magic’s Jonathan Isaac incident. Is it over for Ellen and her talk show?
Also, what is on your summer reading list? We get some recommendations from Shelves Bookstore Owner Abbigail Glen
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