The Bookmark Bookstore

The Bookmark Bookstore is a Friends of the Oakland Public Library nonprofit shop in downtown Oakland, California. Sales of donated books, records, and other items support Oakland Public Library programs and services.

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Interview with The Bookmark Bookstore

The Bookmark is run by Friends of the Oakland Public Library — a nonprofit that supports OPL. That's a very different origin than a private record shop or bookstore. How did vinyl end up on the shelves alongside the books, and what does it fund on the library side?

We tend to sell whatever folks have available to donate and the public is willing to purchase, and vinyl has been a mainstay popular item for both donors and customers for many years! Anecdotally, we're also seeing increasing interest in all things upcycled, old school, and analog, and vinyl sits neatly in the middle of that trend. Our sales of vinyl and all other items in our store support a variety of Oakland Public Library programs and services, some highlights of which include the Oakland Youth Poet Laureate program and scholarship fund, special cultural events, and Summer Reading Program prizes for kids, teens, and adults.

Downtown Oakland has real record shops — Mars, 1-2-3-4 Go!, Econo Jam — plus the massive Berkeley scene next door. What role does The Bookmark play that a private shop doesn't: is it about the mission, the pricing, the browsing experience, all of it?

It's all of it, but it's especially about the mission — since we're a nonprofit and all of our proceeds support Oakland's public libraries, we're unique from private retail operations. Folks return to our store to shop with purpose, knowing their dollars are going directly back into the community.

Your inventory comes from donations rather than purchases — books and records that people give the library. What's the honest picture from what people donate: how often does a donated vinyl collection turn out to have real value, and what does the library do with it when it does?

Folks who donate to the Friends of the Oakland Public Library tend to bring items with a broad spectrum of value. If we receive an item in mint condition, unsealed and unplayed, or in good condition from a well-known rock/pop artist, we'll research the item's value for potential resale on our eBay store, where we list thousands of higher value items and hidden gems not sold in our brick-and-mortar bookstore. Generally, everything else that appears unscathed and intact will be priced and sold at a deep discount in our store's big white vinyl display unit, internally known as "Moby" (for its whale-like size).

What are the genres, eras, or artists that show up most often in donated Oakland-area collections — and does that regional pattern surprise anyone who assumes a library-donation shop would be all easy listening?

We see lots of music from days of yore (think jazzy orchestral pops, yodeling, choral performances) that may not be so popular today, and otherwise our donations tend to skew heavily classical. In addition to large compilations of various opera and instrumental or orchestral performances, we also get a smattering of vintage and modern rock and pop — enough to keep our selection eclectic and interesting for the casual collector.

The Bay Area has fog, salt air, and a lot of records that lived in older Oakland houses for decades. What condition damage do you see most in donated Oakland collections, and what would you tell someone thinking about donating?

We do sometimes see vinyl arrive in poor condition — super scratched, dirty, dusty, or missing its inner or outer album sleeve. We can only sell vinyl that is unscratched and has its outer sleeve still intact. We can live without the inner sleeve!

When a donor drops off records they think are valuable — Beatles, Zeppelin, jazz first pressings — what's the honest conversation you have with them about what typically turns out to have real resale value versus what doesn't?

We try to spare our donors from conversations about the potential value of their items — we even leave the estimated value blank on our donation forms for folks to choose their own adventure for their own tax purposes. On our end, we understand it can be quite emotional for some folks to part with their beloved collections (or that of a loved one who has recently downsized or passed away), so we try to minimize the pain of giving away precious belongings. Since we receive a high volume of donations during our donation windows, this also relieves pressure on volunteers so they don't need to engage in condition or pricing conversations with interested donors while trying to manage the initial sorting of a mountain of materials.

What's the wildest or most memorable thing that's come through as a library donation — a record, a book, a whole collection you weren't expecting?

One time we found over six hundred dollars in cash stuffed into a single book, which we are a little embarrassed to admit we didn't notice until right before the book made its way onto our store shelves. It was unfortunately too late to track down the original owner, so we treated it as a donation (the equivalent of an entire day of sales). Other big ticket items have included vintage maps that resulted in over $10,000 in sales, and some first edition publications by famous authors and historical figures. Perhaps most memorably, we accepted a donation of 10,000 cookbooks from a single donor, and it took us over a year and a half to process and sell them all — enough titles to exceed the height of the Salesforce tower when stacked!

Running a bookstore/vinyl shop as a library-support nonprofit is a very specific model — different from private retail in almost every way. For someone thinking about starting a similar nonprofit shop attached to a library, museum, or community organization, what did you learn early on that you wish someone had told you?

The work never ends, and that's wonderful! The enthusiasm and support for nonprofits of this nature is the fuel that keeps us going amidst a challenging political backdrop. Our steady sea of donated materials, paid annual memberships, and loyal customers never cease to astonish me! What we do is entirely made possible by the generous time and gifts of the public, and that generosity has given me so much life. As a part-time substitute librarian for OPL, I get to see firsthand what FOPL's grants provide for our library patrons, and that continues to be one of the greatest joys of my professional career. Out of all of the library environments where I've worked — corporate, academic, specialized, public, and nonprofit — this is certainly the most unique due to its model, and I hope to see it and other Friends groups continue to thrive for decades.

Last updated: 2026-10-18

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