Porter Square Books in Cambridge, Mass., plans to open a second location, in Boston's Seaport neighborhood, in conjunction with the creative writing nonprofit GrubStreet.
While noting that many specifics have yet to be nailed down, Porter Square Books owner David Sandberg reported that the Seaport location will have about 1,700 square feet of selling space, which is a little more than half the selling space of the original location, as well as a cafe and events space. It will be part of a new "literary center" comprised of GrubStreet, the bookstore and the poetry nonprofit Mass Poetry. According to GrubStreet, the literary center is expected to open late winter/early spring 2020.
Sandberg expects to hire a new team of frontline booksellers for the new store, but the manager will likely come from Porter Square's management team. Buying, social media and marketing, meanwhile, will be handled by the Cambridge store.
"I think this store is going to have its own identity," said Sandberg. "But it will be connected. It's not going to be random."
When asked how the Seaport location will differ from the original Porter Square Books, Sandberg answered that it will be much more closely aligned with GrubStreet than the main store. He explained that while they do carry some GrubStreet authors in the Cambridge store already, they will likely be featured much more prominently in the Seaport location. He added that the Seaport is a much more tourist-heavy area than Porter Square, and that will likely have an effect on what they carry, as well as how they market the store.
Sandberg said that the plan for the Seaport location is to have a dedicated event space, which the original store does not have. The exact size of that events space isn't set, but the main thing, Sandberg continued, is that "it allows us to leverage the additional space for events." There might be authors who would be a better fit for the Seaport store than the original store, and there might even be authors whom they'll want to bring to both stores.
"On the one hand, our store has an incredibly strong identity and brand," Sandberg said. "On the other hand, our identity and brand is as a community bookstore. And we need to translate that to a new community."
Many other details about the second location are still in flux. Sandberg isn't sure yet how many new booksellers they'll hire, or what the new store's hours will be. For example, GrubStreet classes typically go until 10 p.m. each night, so he and his team are considering whether they'll stay open that late every night. And the original Porter Square Books, which also has a cafe, opens at 7 a.m.; he is unsure if the Seaport location will also be open that early. A lot of staffing decisions, he said, will depend on the store's hours.
On the subject of how the decision to open a second store came about, Sandberg replied simply that it came about because of GrubStreet. Over the years, he said, there have been instances where one developer or another has approached them about possibly opening a bookstore in a new development, and in all of those cases the answer was "no, thanks." But when GrubStreet, an organization with which Porter Square has frequently collaborated, approached the store, it "seemed like a different thing."
"My general feeling about Boston bookstores is there's far too few of them," said Sandberg. "I'm glad we're helping to change that. It's something we're really excited about, and GrubStreet is really excited about." --Alex Mutter