Authors Owning Bookstores

Did you know that mega bestselling author Jeff Kinney owns a bookstore? I didn’t. Until recently. And no, he’s not the only one.

I obviously don’t have a definitive list of authors who also own bookstores, but there’s several who do. But I think the idea is pretty great. Obviously this isn’t something that just any author can do. He’s said that his building cost millions to build. It’s state-of-the-art and rather large. So I don’t know about you, but I don’t think I could afford (or get) that kind of loan with my current finances. He also hosts author events for authors he knows personally. Again, this is probably not something you or I could do.

But I think it’s a cool idea. Obviously authors who do this want to make money from their investment, but bringing people together who love books and making some money from it (after taking all the risk) isn’t the worst thing in the world.

I think authors owning bookstores could become something of a trend. We know there aren’t as many bookstores as there used to be, so this could be a way to attract people into indie stores. They could potentially meet one of their favorite authors just by going in. What do you think of authors owning their own bookstores?