Megan Kocher & Heather Ites: Amazon Bookstore Cooperative

From left to right: Megan Kocher and Heather Ites
Circa 1970-something, “two women decided to gather some books on women’s topics and offer them for sale on the front porch of their living collective,” and according to its website, Amazon Bookstore has been around ever since. It remains the oldest independent feminist bookstore in North America.
Megan Kocher and Heather Ites help run and own Amazon Bookstore Cooperative. Here’s Megan and Heather…

How did you find your way to Amazon Bookstore Cooperative? And how does it feel to work at the oldest independent bookstore in North America?
Heather: At the beginning of this year I began the book group “Girl on Girl Reading Action.� As an avid reader and a recent graduate of the Gender, Women, and Sexuality studies department at the University of Minnesota, I was expressly interested in continuing my reading and discussing of books with women in the community. I figured Amazon was the best place to hold the book group. By our fourth meeting of the group I was a working member of Amazon Bookstore Coop. I couldn’t be more proud of working for the oldest feminist bookstore in North America.
Has Amazon Bookstore’s mission changed since its founding in 1970? Do you see more changes in the future?
Heather: I think it would be impossible for a coop as old as ours to not have shifting missions and goals to accommodate the changing political and social climate as well as the basic needs of women, feminists, and families in our community. Change is inevitable and I believe that the store will continue to evolve in a progressive way

How does Amazon thrive as a cooperative? Can you still buy a book from Amazon even if you are not a member?
Megan: Amazon is cooperatively owned, not a consumer co-op. This means that it is owned by a group of at least 5 employees at any given time – theoretically at least. We’re working on re-writing our bylaws to include more of our part-time and newer employees right now because as our financial situation has worsened in recent years, we have not been able to have as many full-time employees. I personally really like this ownership structure. For me, it has meant that one single person doesn’t always have to shoulder the whole burden of owning a business and that, as a worker, I feel empowered to make changes and implement my own ideas for the store, and that when we have staff meetings and are making decisions, I don’t feel at all shy about speaking up or question whether my ideas are heard.
As for customers, everyone is welcome to shop here. We do offer a membership wherein customers can pay $20 per year and save 10% on all new book purchases. We also have an Avid Reader punch card that anyone can take and use to save money on books.
How did Ani DiFranco’s first poetry reading at Amazon go? Can you recall some of your most memorable performances and readings at Amazon?
Megan: Ani Difranco’s first ever book reading was such a whirlwind for us and we were so excited to host it. Her publicist didn’t actually contact us until about four days before the event. We really couldn’t have pulled it off without a lot of help from our neighbors and volunteers. We managed to get a space at the theater next door and to borrow a stage, lighting and sound equipment from our neighbors. We also pulled together a great group of volunteers to help staff at the event.
For me, it was a great testament to the relationships we’ve built both in our immediate community and the Twin Cities feminist community. And, of course, Ani was wonderful. It was really interesting getting to watch her perform in such an intimate setting. I think the audience question and answer session went especially well. People asked really intelligent questions and she was very open and candid in her responses. It was a totally different feel than one of her concerts.
Other readings that have been especially exciting for me were Alison Bechdel, Michelle Tea, Rebecca Walker. Getting to meet some of my favorite authors is definitely one of the perks of my job. I also really enjoy when local authors such as Lori Lake, Ellen Hart, or Catherine Friend do readings here because they have a relationship with the store and the staff.

What does Amazon mean to you personally? And how would you describe Amazon to someone who has never been to a feminist bookstore? What makes Amazon Bookstore Cooperative different from say…Amazon.com?
Megan: The Amazon Bookstore has a very special place in my heart. It is the first place I found when I moved to Minneapolis and didn’t know a soul. Through some wonderful kismet, I managed to get a job here the first week that I lived here. I met my first Minneapolis friends in the feminist/activist book group I started here (which is, sadly, now defunct).
That, right there, is what sets us apart from amazon.com. Amazon.com is a website, they do not care what you buy or provide a space for your book group, your art, or your community announcements. The difference is our ethics. Our business is run around principles. When you walk in our door, you will know that you are in a progressive, women-friendly space. Even the non-book items we carry are carefully selected and include mostly Fair-Trade, and locally and independently produced items. The difference is that a person can walk into our store, settle down in a chair and look at our books. Our customers like to talk to us about what they’re reading, and the money they spend here goes back to the community.

Heather: Amazon is a historic and dynamic place where people can come to feel belonging and community, to get information and books they can’t find anywhere else, and to talk to each other about things that are important to humanity. Personally, I can’t think of anything more necessary than a space that can help facilitate change and progressive growth. Literature has been historically seen as a liberating space, a transgressive space, and having that filtered through a corporate entity like large bookstores or online mega-giants is scary, scary indeed to me. Without free spaces, free thinking spaces, this world is in dire trouble. And with more and more independent booksellers going out of business, it is more important than ever to be conscious of what you are actually supporting. Where your money goes and where you spend your time tells you what you support in a practical sense not just in a theoretical sense.

Do you recommend any new books that have hit the shelves of your store? What are some issues that you think many feminist authors are taking up and writing about?
Heather: I Got Thunder: Black Women Songwriters and Their Craft by LaShonda Barnett. This is a great collection of interviews with amazing black female songwriters. Barnett asks wonderful intersecting questions that challenge what you might think it’s like for these artful women. Intimate conversations with amazing artists, what more could you want.
The Nature of Home: Taking Root in a Place by Greta Gaard. Ms. Gaard is a local author and intellectual that does a wonderful job in this book of making complex theoretical ideas and debates accessible to her readers in a powerful and lasting way. She fluidly moves through sexuality, gender, race, privilege, power, identity, age, and spirituality to understand one’s place in the larger socio-political sphere of environment, justice, responsibility, and community. The personal is political and Ms. Gaard eloquently provides this position to you without you having to even think about it.
I think Greta Gaard is a great example of what is happening with feminist writing. There is this wonderful intersection of theory, personal interjection, and the actual practice of what “feminism� means. And like the store, I think that feminism is adapting in a progressive way to the needs of women, girls, families, and men. Feminism is taking a good long look at itself and changing accordingly – it isn’t just for well off white women anymore. Feminism is community and I think feminist writers are really trying to reflect that.
Megan: I am a cookbook fiend, so I’m very excited about the recent release of Veganomicon by Isa Chandra Moskowitz and Terry Hope Romero. Other books I’ve read recently and liked a lot are No One Belongs Here More Than You by Miranda July and Robot Dreams, a graphic novel by Sara Varon. I’m also just about to start reading A Dangerous Woman: The Graphic Biography of Emma Goldman by Sharon Rudahl and I think that looks pretty promising.