In Japan, a new kind of bookstore is reviving the joy of browsing with a unique shelf-sharing model. Customers can now rent shelves to sell their own curated selection of books, offering a personal touch that traditional stores and online retailers often lack. Tomoyo Ozumi, a delighted customer, exemplifies the eclectic choices found in these shops, holding an illustrated book of cheeses that she never expected to find.
The concept aims to bring back the charm of physical bookstores to communities where many have closed down. Shogo Imamura, a 40-year-old novelist, opened one such store in Tokyo’s Kanda Jimbocho district in April. His shop, named Honmaru—referring to the core of a Japanese castle—covers just 53 square meters (570 square feet) and features 364 shelves filled with books on diverse topics, from business strategy and manga to martial arts. “Traditional bookstores rely on sales statistics and exclude less popular books,” says Imamura. “We ignore such principles and focus on passion over profit. It’s a way to reconstruct bookstores.”
Shelf renters, who pay between 4,850 and 9,350 yen ($32-$61) per month, range from individuals to companies and small publishers. Each shelf acts as a physical representation of a social media profile, where sellers showcase their personal book collections. Creative director Kashiwa Sato describes it as “a real-life version of Instagram or Facebook.”
Imamura hopes to expand his store model beyond Tokyo to regions severely impacted by bookstore closures. According to the Japan Publishing Industry Foundation for Culture, more than 600 bookstores shut down in the 18 months leading up to March 2023, and a quarter of Japan’s municipalities currently lack a physical bookstore.
To learn from surviving shops, Imamura visited dozens of bookstores in 2022, noting how many added cafes or gyms to draw in customers. However, he argues that these additions can overshadow the primary purpose of the store. “If a gym becomes more profitable, it risks turning the bookstore into just another gym,” he cautioned.
Rokurou Yui, president of book review site All Reviews, has also embraced the shelf-sharing model with his three bookstores in Tokyo. His stores, filled with books chosen out of pure passion, feel like “hearing voices of recommendations,” he says. Yui and his father opened their first store, Passage, in 2022, and have since expanded to three more locations. Their fourth bookstore, inside a French language school, opened in October.
Japan’s Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry has recognized the cultural significance of bookstores, launching a project to support these hubs of knowledge. “Bookstores are essential for maintaining diverse ideas and transmitting culture,” it said in a recent statement.
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