This week, we got an order for books from one of the historic sites for Sheila Ingle‘s book Brave Elizabeth. As we were working out the details of delivery of the books, the purchasing specialist told me that she really liked the mission statement of Harrelson Press.
It’s pretty simple:
Harrelson Press tells the stories of the forgotten, the silenced, and the oppressed. Stories have transformed our lives by helping us dream bigger. We choose stories that will do the same for our readers.
But when you think about it the book business is ultimately about making money for most places, so to choose stories that are going to ask readers to expand their ideas and perspectives is asking for profits to be secondary to what we do. And that’s just fine with us. We like being different.
In fact, this weekend, we went out of our way to hand deliver books to a new customer. Sure, it would have been much easier to mail the box of books, but easier doesn’t always mean better. This weekend as we walked the books into the bookstore, we heard:
Wow, that was nice of you to bring them all the way here.
We’re happy to do it because we are proud of what we are doing, and we know the books are going to change the lives of readers.