Gold Beach Books is like most businesses of its ilk these days, waiting for the all-clear to re-open doors during the coronavirus outbreak.
But it’s fair to say the store’s owners, a family of four sisters from Portland, have never been busier than during the past three weeks.
Shortly after the pandemic hit, Teri Watkins Peterson and her sisters made a public offer: want a free book? We have books. Just give us the genre, and we’ll mail one, no strings attached.
At first, they received 10 or 15 requests a day, a few hundred in total during the first two week of the offer. Then three weeks ago, OregonLive wrote a story about Gold Beach Books’ offer. Watkins Peterson was asked in the story when they might end such an offer.
When it brings us to our knees, she said.
Seven hours after the story posted on OregonLive, it brought the sisters to their knees. Before the end of the day, they had to halt the offer following a deluge of book requests.
Watkins Peterson wouldn’t reveal the exact number of books they gave away, but said “it was thousands. And thousands and thousands of postage.”
After the offer ended, thousands more requests for books bounced back to the person emailing. Those receiving books had no idea what title they were about to get, only the book’s genre. Gold Beach Books sent a book to at least one person in all 50 states.
Three weeks later, Watkins Peterson says they didn’t receive one complaint.
“In this day and age, when does that happen? It’s heartwarming,” Watkins Peterson said. “I’m telling you, this was an amazing experience. America really responded.”
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They received letters with $10 bills and checks, asking to keep the book giveaway going. One person sent them a $100 check, saying they’d like a “nice cookbook, and keep the change.”
They had the occasional odd book request, and in one case, was able to fulfill it. A husband and wife from Kentucky asked for a book that would help research their family’s history from Kentucky and Ohio. Watkins Peterson’s sister Traci found such a book, “Kentucky’s Bicentennial Family Register.”
(courtesy Teri Watkins Peterson)
“It was so random and specific. We were absolutely tickled to find such a book,” Watkins Peterson said.
Thank you notes by the hundreds poured into the book store’s email box, and Facebook page.
A retired high school principal from Bend received a book titled “The Good Listener: Helen Bamber a Life Against Cruelty.” He wrote back saying “your gift is unprecedented in my 75 years and makes me want to do similarly.”
One person, one of many who requested a book after they shut down the offer, wrote “You guys are awesome! You have inspired me to try and do this with my kid’s school.”
Another person receiving a book about China wrote that she had recently been laid off from a job and “these little things mean a lot … books have been one thing that have been keeping me sane.”
The four sisters and three people who work at the bookstore spent almost three weeks making mailing labels, picking out books from an inventory of more than 60,000 titles and wrapping each in brown paper. Cars were loaded with books and driven to the post office, which was a process itself.
The Gold Beach post office could only handle 50 books at a time. Watkins Peterson said they often drove books to Portland and looked for post offices with the most windows.
As a result of the book giveaway, Watkins Peterson said the bookstore had received a small spike in online sales. But that wasn’t the point behind the project.
“We were looking for something genuine to help people out,” Watkins Peterson said. “Most exciting is a lot of people said they hope to visit the town of Gold Beach after the quarantine. That would be such a boon for the town.”
Now that the dust has settled, would Gold Beach Books make such an offer again?
“I would hope circumstances are never replicated to where we would do another charitable act like this,” said Watkins Peterson, referring to coronavirus. “But yes, I think so. But we need to recover.”
-- Nick Daschel | ndaschel@oregonian.com | @nickdaschel
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