June 2, 2004

Willow Glen Books
A quiet oasis on Lincoln Avenue

By Carol Rosen
Editor

Outside the traffic was crazy; the streets were more crowded than usual on a Monday morning and it was raining. Yet inside Willow Glen Books was a sense of peace and calm along with a quiet relaxation not typical of any Monday morning. What a luxury to spend time browsing for just the right book in an atmosphere lacking the tension and hurly burly of chain bookstores.

Willow Glen Books, 1330 Lincoln Avenue, is the rarest of bookstores, designed with its customers in mind. Since 1992, owner Cathy Adkins has been catering to her customers with a mix of books that they want to read and an atmosphere conducive to reading and learning.

“When I first opened the store, I chose to be a general bookstore and stocked a lot of different books, including romances and Westerns. But early on, I realized that my customers were more interested in general fiction and mysteries. As the years have gone by, I’ve offered them the types of books they like, including a lot of local authors. We’re a neighborhood book store, and we cater to our neighborhood,” Adkins says.

The store is totally unlike chain bookstores. Adkins carries lots of local authors, not carried by the chains. She also offers many political books and biographies along with escape and literary fiction allowing customers the luxury of “understanding and getting a respite from the world at the same time.”

Adkin’s philosophy is simple: give the customers what they want in the way they want. “We learn from our customers. We’ve developed the store to be unlike any other store. We’re the only place that carries certain books. Our customers get to know our staff and we get to know what people like to read. Most important, we try to connect with out customers, to give them pleasure; that’s one thing customers value,” Adkins adds.

In her 12 years of business on Lincoln Avenue she’s striven for compatibility between herself and her business neighborhood. While she’s lived in Almaden Valley since 1978 and loves living there, she also feels very much at home in Willow Glen. “I spend a lot of my day in this part of town. I wouldn’t have found compatibility with customers elsewhere. Running this bookstore gives me satisfaction. I feel like I’m doing something important.”

“Cathy’s fabulous. This is the greatest bookstore. I love to come here,” said Mimi Ahern, a regular customer who lives in Willow Glen. Ahern, a reading recovery and literacy coach and teacher at Briarwood School in the Santa Clara School District orders books for her school from Willow Glen Books. “I order for my school and Cathy sets it up so it’s really easy for me.”

Adkins also orders a lot of books for her customers. She says she uses a service that allows quick turnaround. If a book is out of print, she often suggests customers try a used bookstore because it will be easier and much less expensive for them. In the case of children’s books, she typically checks with Hicklebees—just a few doors down Lincoln Avenue. “I try to avoid sending people to the chain [bookstores],” she adds.

Like most independent bookstore owners, Adkins is not a fan of the chain stores. The nice thing about running an independent bookstore, she says, is that she doesn’t have to carry every book that comes out, but only the ones that her customers will read. And the good thing about being in an area for so long is that she knows her customers. This gives the bookstore’s staff a chance to “give books space, allow them a chance to be found,” she says.

It’s important, she adds, in a political year to offer political and election information and books. “We want people to vote and to vote in an informed way.” Thus, Willow Glen Books will carry a lot of political books this summer to allow customers to become more informed. “It’s not sacred, it’s the rite of people to read and explore books. The little independent bookstore is protecting rights for its local citizens.”

The store is also a haven for book clubs—one meets every fourth Monday at the store, poetry readings, writers groups and a general neighborhood meeting place over the years. She also helps the Association of American University Women, whose groups sometimes hold author events to raise money. “They line up the authors and sell the books and I get a commission.”

Adkins does very few author book readings because her customers aren’t too interested. When she first opened the store, she had authors and new books, but she called the sessions “difficult and frustrating” because few people attended. “I don’t try to fill up the calendar,” she says.

So, if you’re full of tension and have a few minutes off, spend some quiet time looking for books at Willow Glen Books. If you can’t find what you are looking for Adkins, clerk Tina Drew or her son Paul Adkins, who also works in the store, will help you find it or order it.