Brookline Booksmith

The Brookline Booksmith is a locally established independent bookshop offering new & used novels, and texts of all genres. The Booksmith also offers literature based gifts and trinkets.
Lydia McOscar (she/her), Assistant Buyer and Manager:

What are the protocols that you have recently been following?
Right now, we have a limited capacity in the store, so no more than 90 customers at a time to allow for social distancing. Everyone in the store, staff and customers, must be masked at all times. We also do regular cleaning at the end of every night. All the frequently-touched surfaces are wiped down. We have curbside pickup in place for people who want to pick up their books without coming in-store. We have low contact and we do a lot more phone orders and website orders for those customers as well.

How do you think that these protocols have been faring in terms of how many customers have been coming in, and also in keeping people safe?
It’s varied a lot over the course of the past year or so. I think we have a lot more people shopping in-store than we had at any time since the start of the pandemic. People have been very appreciative the entire time of the low-contact options, and we’re doing a lot more phone orders and online orders and just more non-visitation pickup orders than we have in the past year. We’ve seen an increase in people being able to shop those other ways.

What would you say to anyone who may be considering coming to Brookline Booksmith?
Just assure them that we’re taking as many precautions as we can, and we also completely understand if you’d rather not shop in-person. We’re trying to accommodate every level of people’s comfort or discomfort and give them extra precautions whenever we can. I would encourage them to give us a call if they have any questions before visiting, or if there’s anything else we can do for them.