KD's Books in Lee's Summit, Mo., will be moving to a new location with the help of a successful GoFundMe campaign, KMBC9 reported.
The bookstore's last day at 241 SE Main St. will be April 30; after that, it will move to a new, smaller location in downtown Lee's Summit. The move, store co-owner Nicole Perne explained, was necessitated by a major rent increase.
In an early March Facebook post, Perne said she'd found a smaller location that would be much more sustainable for the bookstore long term, but it couldn't be done without community support. She launched a GoFundMe campaign with a goal of $15,000 on March 6. In less than 48 hours it had raised $12,000, and the total now stands at $15,500.
"We are so incredibly grateful to be surrounded by this community," Perne wrote in a thank-you post on March 8. "So many of our customers have become friends over the years. You're the reason we want to continue this journey and stay right here in DTLS for many years to come."
KD's Books first opened in downtown Lee's Summit in 1990, originally as a children's bookstore with a small selection of used adult titles. Today it is a general-interest bookstore with new titles for all ages. Tina and Nicole Perne have owned the bookstore for the last four years.
"Downtown Lee's Summit has been always so supportive," Nicole Perne told KMBC9.