Its All Cool - February 2011
Sunday, February 27, 2011
Tree of Life Bookstores
The Tree of Life Bookstore, originating from Marion, Indiana, has seen exceptional growth over the past three years due to their expansion in online book sales. The original bookstore in 1997, founded by Darren and Nancy Campbell and Nancy's parents, Pam and Gary Minnich, was designed to give the community a place to buy Christian books and enjoy a cup of coffee. Soon after, they expanded their business to textbook sales at Indiana Wesleyan University. They now operate twelve college and freestanding bookstores in the Midwest and serve as an online bookstore nationwide.
Recently, Tree of Life Bookstore has branched into online textbook and book sales. This newfound avenue for Tree of Life has created a bustling new growth for Darren's business. He shares, "Because we deal with college students on a daily bases, we knew that an online bookstore was a necessity." When their online services began, they built notability through major online bookstores before growing into their very own Tree of Life online textbook and bookstore, www.treeoflifebooks.com. From a closet, to a garage, to a 20,000 square foot warehouse in Marion, the online business seems to be bursting at the seams. "I would encourage any business owner and entrepreneur to investigate online options for their business," shares Darren when glowing over his growing business.
In their commitment to serve their customers, Tree of Life Bookstores have adapted their textbook sales to help save college students hundreds of dollars each year through textbook rentals. Instead of buying books, new or used, Tree of Life offers dramatically reduced rates for college students when they rent their books for the semester, which saved Indiana Wesleyan students almost half a million dollars this year on textbooks. This service Tree of Life provides is competitive with the market, but exceeds the expectation students have for their textbook providers by offering a consistently lower price by 10% than competing online bookstores.
In Marion and the Midwest, Tree of Life has seen growth and sustainability in the wavering economy and diminishing rate of book sales by focusing on what their customers want and need. Darren expressed, "we seek to have customers for life!" As an entrepreneur who received financial support and guidance from the community of Marion while forming his business years ago, Darren and the Tree of Life staff hope to help other entrepreneurs succeed in the community of Marion today.