Bookseller (Library Shop SD)
Title: Bookseller
Reports To: Library Shop SD Manager
Employment Status: Part-time, Non-Exempt
Schedule: Flexible schedule totaling 15 – 30 hours/week
Location: Library Shop SD’s Central Library and Mission Hills locations
Compensation: $17-$20/hour, depending on experience
Organization Overview:
The Library Foundation SD strengthens communities by supporting excellence in the San Diego Public Library (SDPL) system through philanthropy, advocacy, and outreach. Library Foundation SD supports the entire system of 36 library branches across the City of San Diego. Our team of 16 staff members is based at the downtown Central Library @ Joan Λ Irwin Jacobs Common.
Library Shop SD is a well-curated nonprofit book & gift shop catering to librarians, library lovers, literary obsessives, and book nerds owned and operated by the Library Foundation SD. We are located inside the Downtown Central Library and will soon open a full-service neighborhood bookshop in the Mission Hills neighborhood. Proceeds support the San Diego Public Library system.
The Library Foundation SD is an equal-opportunity employer and embraces a philosophy where diversity and inclusion are core values. As the San Diego Public Library serves every citizen in the City of San Diego, so does the Foundation. A broad understanding of diversity is employed that includes but is not limited to, race, ethnicity, national origin, class, gender identity and/or expression, sexual orientation, disability, age, and religion. Library Foundation SD acknowledges that personal identity is complex and various. Library Foundation SD aims to facilitate broad participation, particularly by historically underrepresented groups, throughout the organization’s staffing and activities.
Position Overview:
The Bookseller position works in the Library Shop, helping customers and patrons and performs general cashier/customer service duties associated with a small independent book & gift shop, including but not limited to:
- Handselling and waiting on customers
- Shipping and receiving merchandise and entering inventory data into the Point-of-Sale system
- Restocking, merchandising, straightening, and styling the Shop
- Light cleaning duty such as sweeping and dusting
- Brainstorming and providing content for social media and marketing
- Working author and outreach events at both Shop locations, the Central Library and other branches, and offsite ‘pop-up’ locations (i.e., conventions and festivals, including Comic Con)
- Maintaining and updating the Shop’s e‑commerce website
Qualifications:
Required
- An abiding appreciation and love for Libraries as essential institutions
- Good customer service skills
- Attention to detail and the ability to multi-task
- Comfortable with uncertainty
- Empathy and compassion for people from all backgrounds and walks of life
- Ability to work effectively without supervision
Preferred
- Previous Retail Experience, especially bookselling
- A passion for books and the written word
- Flexible schedule; available for occasional evening and/or offsite events and ability to pick up extra shifts on short notice
- A good eye for merchandising and appreciation of the Library Shop’s brand aesthetic
- Social media savvy
- Comfortable articulating the Library Foundation’s mission to customers and patrons
Being part of the Library Shop SD Team is not just a retail job- we’re also brand ambassadors for the Library and the Library Foundation SD’s mission and often staff pop-up shops at important community outreach events such as Comic Con, San Diego Pride Festival, or occasionally at Library branches across the city.
How to apply:
Please send a resume and cover letter to the email address below. In your cover letter, please let us know how you learned of this opportunity and answer the question: How has the Library impacted your life
Scott Ehrig-Burgess
Public Engagement Manager
libraryshopjobs@libraryfoundationsd.org