GREENFIELD — Area bookworms will need to use Federal Street Books’ online catalog to replenish their shelves this winter as the bookshop is stopping in-store service for the next two months to conduct inventory organization and other projects.
Federal Street Books, located at 8 Federal St., sells primarily used books, with new titles from local authors and some bestsellers. The bookstore is closed for in-store shopping and curbside services from Jan. 10 to March 5, as current owners Hillary Hoffman and her husband, Neil Serven, complete these projects. The couple purchased the bookstore in October of 2019, and made some changes to the store layout.
“When we bought the store we closed off the basement, which used to be open to customers,” Hoffman said.
The basement and back rooms have since served as storage space for extra inventory, and Hoffman said she and Serven plan to organize these areas. They said the winter months can be slower under normal circumstances, let alone amid the COVID-19 pandemic, making it a good time to conduct this work.
These rooms that customers don’t see are filled with thousands of books. Hoffman said there are more than 18,000 books upstairs, and she estimated there to be more than 10,000 more books downstairs that will be organized and added to their main inventory and virtual catalog.
With the pandemic now lasting almost a full year, Hoffman and Serven have been operating under health safety restrictions for a majority of their time as business owners. Hoffman said it has been a difficult year, but they are grateful for the community support they’ve received.
Since buying the bookstore, Hoffman said she and Serven have also continued to expand their offerings of both used and new books.
“We’ve added more books, including books about anti-racism and contemporary science fiction, more authors of color,” Hoffman said. “We’re bringing in new stuff, and we’ve had a great response to that.”
The store’s complete inventory also includes books on true crime, history, horror, religion, mystery and health, as well as graphic novels.
Hoffman and Serven hope to be “back at full speed” for March 6. In the meantime, customers can browse Federal Street Books’ online catalog at federalstreetbooks.com and search for books by date, author, keyword and genre. Orders within Greenfield are delivered for free, while orders to other towns will be shipped.
Customers can also explore new books the store does not yet have in stock through its Bookshop virtual storefront at bookshop.org/shop/federalstreetbooks. Bookshop, Hoffman said, was created by the American Booksellers Association as an alternative to purchasing books through Amazon. Using the virtual storefront still helps support Federal Street Books through a percentage of sales.
Zack DeLuca can be reached at zdeluca@recorder.com or 413-930-4579.