First, the volunteers at Boxcar Books and the Midwest Pages to Prisoners Project want to thank you for all the support that you have given us for the last three and a half years. We could not do the work that we do if it were not for the patronage, donations, and funding that we have received from conscious citizens like you. You have not let us down and we hope that we have not let you down by striving to maintain our position as not only a great bookstore where you can get information that you may not find anywhere else, but a community center where people are free to express themselves and organize with the intention of making the Bloomington community a more progressive and forward thinking place to live.
We are pleased to announce that Boxcar Books and the Midwest Pages to Prisoners Project will be expanding within the next month!
We will be taking over the space next door, 312 S. Washington St. (formerly the Bellevue Gallery - congrats to Bloomington Playwrights Project on their move to 9th St.!). This expansion will give us more room for our ever-growing and diversifying inventory, a less-crowded and nicer meeting space, room for events, and much-needed space
for Pages to Prisoners!
To do all of this, we need the support from our community. To make this expansion a successful one, we need help with the funding of many obligations including:
Boxcar Books Expansion Expenses:
- fifteen bookshelves at $50 each - $750
- three new magazine/zine racks at $200 each - $600
- misc. furniture - approx. $100
- desk for new office - $100
- computer for office - $400
- lighting - $300
- ordering inventory to fill new shelves - approx. $1000
- increase in rent - $625/month
- increase in bills - approx. $250/month
Pages to Prisoners Expansion Expenses:
- seven bookshelves at $50 ea. - $350
- misc. furniture - approx. $200
- increased postage, packaging supply, book, and photocopy costs - approx. $300/month
Shared Expansion Expenses:
- four folding tables at $125 ea. - $500
- 32 folding chairs $25 ea. - $800
- lighting - $300
- paint - $50
GRAND TOTAL: $6625
We hope that you will be able to support your community bookstore as we undertake this monumental step. If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact us at the
phone number or email address below.
Boxcar Books is a 501(c)3 non-profit corporation. Your donation is tax deductible. Donations can be made three ways:
- Send in a check or money order along with your name, address, and email address to Boxcar Books Attn: Expansion.
- Credit card donations can be made over the phone. Just call 812-339-8710 and give the volunteer your credit card number and the amount you would like to donate!
- You can also donate by sending PayPal funds to donations@boxcarbooks.org, or by simply clicking on this link.
-The Volunteers at Boxcar Books and The Midwest Pages to Prisoners Project
posted by geoff on 11/04/2005 05:42:00 PM
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more photos
posted by geoff on 11/04/2005 10:29:00 AM
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Stayed up until 5 am painting the new pages space and still didn't finish. The good thing about being up at 5 am is that you can actually find pizza in the trash. The bad thing is that sometimes you have to work in 2 hours. With only a few hours before I had to go in to work, I just went over to the office and crashed there. I kept prolonging my lunch hour because it was beautiful out and walking slowly down Kirkwood fealt nice and slow. I feel like I should take a nap, but its too nice out.
posted by geoff on 11/02/2005 03:30:00 PM
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Some nights you just don't want to ride home alone. As I neared Adams on 6th at 3 in the morning, leaves started falling all around me, as if to say, "things change, things change."
I slept in the boat again and Tristan woke me up by throwing a bucket of water on the side of the craft and shouting, "There's land off the starboard bow!" I started laughing, but then fealt weird because I wasn't sure if it might have been a dream.
posted by geoff on 11/01/2005 02:18:00 PM
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This is something that I've wanted to write for a while. I'm going to start making note of what I write people frequently when answering band e-mail and put it on the web just to make things easier.
Q: Do you guys have a guarantee? What are your requirements for setting up a show?
A: In terms of what we ask for in a show, we don't have things like gaurantees. We just hope that people flyer for the show so everybody who's interested in punk shows in your town knows about the show and try to get enough people to come to the show so that a cover charge or donation of around $5 will cover the cost of gas for getting to the show. We also hope that people can help us out with a place to sleep (we're fine with floors, couches, whatever) and maybe some food or at least a suggestion to the whereabouts of a nearby cheap restaurant with vegan options or a grocery store. We hope that people choose a venue that's appropriately sized for the number of people that you expect to show up (and not just counting your best buds). So, if you think 100+ people would like to see the show, maybe doing it at a cool bar that does all-ages shows or renting out a VFW hall. If it's just going to be 40 folks, the basement is better. Finally, we ask that people doing shows provide a PA with at least 2 vocal mics (preferably 3) and at least 2 inputs for plugging things like violin, cello, and banjo into the PA.
Q: Why do you sell t-shirts that may have been made in a sweatshop?
A: When I was attending college at OSU I was involved in various United Students Against Sweatshops campaigns, so I am aware of some of the issues with how many garments are produced, and I am very aware that we have absolutely no knowledge of the conditions of how our t-shirts are currently produced. We are able to get American Apparel shirts from the screen printing shop where Ryan used to work and where all our friends work which is where we currently screen the shirts. However, they are more expensive. We could charge more for shirts, and still have them be reasonably priced, and I think people would be willing to pay more for a more ethically produced shirt. The problem is that with the cheap shirts we have now, we can take them on tour and pay for them after we come back (and have sold some to get money to pay for them). With American Apparel shirts, they are expensive enough (and the screen printing shop has had some accounts go overdue with them) that we would have to pay up front. Since Defiance, Ohio doesn't really make money as a band, we can't afford to pay for American Apparel shirts up front. I guess this brings up the question of whether its worth taking shirts on tour at all if they aren't ethically produced. This is a good question, and I'm not sure how I feel about this yet. It is our hopes that eventually the prices of American Apparel shirts will be low enough that we can afford to buy them up front for tour. Or, maybe we could work something out with friends bands where we can all buy collectively to make the price low enough. I've also heard that there are an increasing number of non-US t-shirt factories that have certified working conditions. All of these might be good options. While those are being explored, I guess the best I can offer is that we will screenprint designs on any fabric that people mail to us. So, if someone wants a Defiance, Ohio T-shirt but doesn't want one that is on a potentially sweathshop-produced t-shirt, they can send us a recycled thrift-store shirt, or send us an American Apparel shirt, and we will gladly screen print it for them. Folks can mail the shirts to
PO Box 1218
Bloomington, IN
47402
and should include enough money to cover return shipping.
My friend Mikeal responded with the following ideas about sweat-free t-shirts:
First (and this is something i'm sure you know) is that even anti-sweatshop groups
don't promote actually boycotting sweatshop-using companies. the reason is
that contracts in sweatshops are sketchy to begin with and the employees are
just barely surviving in the first place, so if the corporation using a shop
has a decrease in sales, guess who doesn't have any work at all anymore? so
you have people who are just making it by to begin with now with no income.
also, american apparel may not be the best solution. there's a lot of
documentation out there about how the chief executive of AA, Dov Charney, is
a total piece of shit and has lawsuits against him for sexual harrassment.
you may want to check out this article: http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/05_26/b3939108_mz017.htm
Despite marketing itself as sweatshop-free (which is actually true), AA is
still anti-labor. Attempts to unionize AA shops met with intimidation
campaigns so fierce that the National Labor Relations Board had to step in.
I've also read of AA paying it's own store employees at less than a living
wage.
Beyond that, it needs to be faced that American Apparel is still just a
profit-driven clothing company that just happens to appeal to rich college
liberals. The Gateway Center finally opened up this year, and the first
store to move in down the street (on the corner of 5th and High) is American
Apparel. They are a yuppie clothing store and have no problem assisting with
gentrification efforts in every town they open stores. Now that they're
opening a store here, how long do you think it will take Campus Partners to
put the final squeeze on pushing out the rest of the low-income housing
around campus, or the independent sex shops and bookstores that lie in
between 5th and the Short North?
posted by geoff on 10/30/2005 10:33:00 AM
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