About the Friends of the Lexington Public Library
The Friends of the Lexington Public Library, a registered 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization, was established in 1967 to support non-essential library services through the donation of money and volunteer hours to the Lexington Public Library. This support can be seen in many areas, and we enjoy a fantastic working relationship with the Lexington Public Library and the Lexington community as a whole.
Our largest impact is something that you can see physically. Throughout the years, we have helped fund the construction of a great majority of the new library branches around Lexington. Between 1972 and 2024, a large number of the constructed library branches were partially funded by our aggressive fundraising efforts.
In addition to funding the construction of new library branches in our community, we also give back to the library in a myriad of other ways, from funding library branch remodeling efforts to funding gatherings for library staff and community outreach events.
While our fundraising for the Lexington Public Library is an integral part of our mission, we have previously provided support, primarily in the form of material donations, to other local community organizations around Lexington. For nearly sixty years, our immense fundraising efforts have totaled hundreds of thousands of dollars. Our support has a visible impact on the Lexington community, and our board members, staff, and volunteer team all work tirelessly to support our community. We are passionate about the Lexington community and the Lexington Public Library, and our support demonstrates our dedicated commitment to establishing ourselves as a powerful force in the community.
Our main source of revenue is our bookstore, the Friends Book Cellar. Opened in 1998 in the lower level of the Central Library, the Friends Book Cellar maintains an ever-growing inventory of tens of thousands of items and is the main driving force behind our monetary success. With competitive pricing, wide variety, and friendly staff, the Friends Book Cellar is a popular downtown Lexington attraction and a customer favorite among local bookstores!
In May 2023, the Friends Book Cellar gained a new manager, Simon Boes. Under his visionary leadership, the Friends Book Cellar has been transformed and modernized in a number of ways, including through the expansion of the physical store space (January 2024) and the implementation of a new Square point-of-sale system for efficiency, and the extension of customer promotions.
Besides the bookstore refresh, Simon has also been influential in other areas within the Friends Book Cellar and the greater Friends of the Lexington Public Library organization. For example, since early 2023, Simon has worked with local breweries and other community spaces to host off-site book sales, allowing us to take inventory to other local businesses and expand our reach within the community.
Some organizations that we’ve worked with include:
- Black Children in Books
- Blue Stallion Brewing Company
- Burl Brew/The Burl
- Friends of Spencer County Public Library
- Good Foods Co-Op
- Lexington Public Library Foundation
- Mirror Twin Brewing
- Old North Bar
- Pivot Brewing
- Rock House Brewing
- Sharp Futures Foundation
- William Wells Brown Elementary School
Additionally, we’ve been holding book sales since 1971. Our biannual book sales are famous, and you may best remember them from when we filled large warehouses up with hundreds of thousands of items for purchase. In recent years, however, the book sales have been held at the Friends Book Cellar location. Thanks to increasing community donations, we’ve had no trouble maintaining a large volume of book sale inventory in the smaller space.
Our famous biannual book sales are another community favorite, and their widespread success allows us to provide a large financial contribution to the Lexington Public Library twice a year. To tackle the issue of leftover book sale inventory, we have been pursuing bulk buyers, recyclers, or resellers to purchase the remains by the truckload, ensuring that nothing is thrown away and allowing us to maximize our monetary contribution.
Finally, our organization maintains two online storefronts: one on eBay (established 2002) and one on Amazon (established 2008). On these online stores, we sell books, media, and other items that we have determined to be of a higher value; items that we believe would fetch a higher price when not sold through the physical Friends Book Cellar store. 100% of the proceeds from both online stores go back to the Lexington Public Library!
After learning about our mission to provide items for fair prices, people occasionally question why we opt to sell books online. There are two reasons that we decided long ago to adopt this practice. First, doing this allows us to better support the Lexington Public Library. When we sell a valuable item online for a higher price, we can provide higher monetary support to the library with each book sold. Second, many of these items are rather obscure or often sought-after, so by being listed on the internet, these items are afforded greater exposure, meaning they can be found by collectors and enthusiasts all around the world rather than a smaller local audience in the bookstore.
Thanks to detailed attention to the online sales department by the Friends Book Cellar staff and a number of dedicated volunteers, our sales turnover on eBay and Amazon is robust. With the recent purchase of several new computers and the training of more volunteers for listing items, our eBay and Amazon stores are very productive, providing even more monetary support for the Lexington Public Library.
Under the leadership of Friends Book Cellar manager Simon Boes and Friends of the Lexington Public Library board president Rod Brotherton, our organization has enjoyed unprecedented growth in recent years. In the past several years alone, we have provided tens of thousands of dollars to the Lexington Public Library, helped fund the development of a groundbreaking new library branch, and participated in numerous community events, a new development under new leadership.
We are always looking for new ways to grow our brand and mission, and we would love your support! There are a plethora of ways to support us, and we invite you to visit the Friends Book Cellar to learn more about our organization and what we do. You can become a member of the Friends of the Library, providing a yearly monetary donation to us and enjoying a host of benefits at the Friends Book Cellar and book sales. We also greatly appreciate donations of money or gently used items, and we’d love for you to check out our online stores or visit us at one of our off-site sales events.