OCEAN CITY - Friends since childhood, Nancy Miller and Rosalyn Lifshin had a dream of one day owning a bookstore.
"I was a writer and I always loved being surrounded by books," said Miller, 56, of Ocean City. "Growing up, my father put bookshelves on all four of my walls. I grew up surrounded by books."
So when an Ocean City bookstore was liquidating almost 13 years ago, the friends decided to buy it, using about $100,000 in savings to restock depleted inventory at Sun Rose Words & Music, Miller said.
Miller and Lifshin, also 56, of Ocean City, became independent bookstore owners at a time of historic shifts in the bookselling industry as Internet-based booksellers surged, some mega-chain bookstores rose and fell, and electronic books and e-readers emerged.
"We've been here since Internet shopping bloomed and now electronically. The wheels keep turning here," Lifshin said.
The past few months have been a prime example of changes locally.
The once-giant Borders liquidated all its stores, including its Hamilton Township one, and another chain, Books-A-Million, plans to take over at that location later this year. And Atlantic Books announced it was shuttering stores in beach resorts, including in Ocean City, Stone Harbor, Beach Haven and Cape May.
The 2,500-square-foot Sun Rose Words & Music, located on Asbury Avenue in downtown Ocean City, sells all varieties of books and music, as well as some office supplies like flash drives and memory cards. The business also expanded to sell puzzles, games and other items to supplement the bookselling business.
Being an independent bookstore has specific advantages, the owners said. They don't have high overhead and are able to make quick decisions to hold certain sales or stock more specific types of items, they said.
Being located in Ocean City helps business, they said.
"If you took (the bookstore) somewhere else, would it survive somewhere else than Ocean City? I don't know," Lifshin said.
"It's a seashore resort, and people need a book for the beach," she said. "And we have a very loyal customer base here in Ocean City of year-round residents. They keep us going three seasons out of the four, and the tourists keep us going in the summer."
The business has also been helped by its distributors, who over the past few years have lowered the minimum number of special orders for shipping from 50 to 15, they said.
This makes it faster for the bookstore to get customer-requested books it doesn't have in stock, helping keep their inventory in check while providing fast turnaround on orders.
In many cases, the bookstore can get special request books in a day or two, Miller said.
Print books still make up most books sales in the country.
And the closing of some chain bookstores have brought more customers to their bookstore, Lifshin said.
"With the electronic books becoming more popular, the market for paper books may be shrinking but the number of bookstores is shrinking equally so we can maintain a market share. It's still a big market," she said.
Owners: Nancy Miller, 56, and Rosalyn Lifshin, 56, both of Ocean City
In business: 37 years, since 1998 under current ownership
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