The Beat A resident cat named Cleo prowls the stacks, rescued by owner Diane Meredith when an entire litter of kittens was abandoned in a nearby alley almost twenty years ago. Brynne Glynn, a Dusty sales clerk for two years now, describes what appears to verge on obsession: “We believe in material books. Not, like, get rid of Kindles or anything, but holding [a book] in your hand is something else.” As she continues slipping new dust jackets on some recently acquired hardcovers, Brynne elaborates on how much Dusty and its employees respect their wares, explaining, “Every book that comes through the store is hand cleaned. All the stickers, dust and crap come off. We see all of them. We’re very picky, like a woman with high standards.” And most astounding of all, there is no computerized inventory system, no database to look up any of their titles. It’s all indexed by the employee’s memory. “You learn by working. By six months, [you] will probably know where everything is, or at least where it should be,” Brynne asserts. It’s hard to imagine any other type of business even trying such a thing. That kind of dedication and attention to detail is refreshing to see, especially in a time where a premium is put on broad efficiency and volume selling. However, despite how seriously they treat their books and consider the business itself, the staff and owners themselves are a relaxed and imaginative group. When Wesley Brooks was recently hired, instead of a paper application, cover letter or resume, he describes turning in a collection of themed cupcakes, each based on a book he’d loved. “There was the Fear And Loathing cupcake, filled with ‘drugs,’ The Road cupcake, which was gray and ashy... I always think of things so literally.” But this kind of submission is far from rare - it’s actually encouraged. Lili Torres, a frequent visitor to Dusty and an employee of an affiliated store explains her experiences: “It’s incomparable. It’s like a family... There’s tons of respect, amazing hours. I mean, we have a snack bar.” This is all part of
an understood language, the tongue of Dusty, where ingenuity is rewarded alongside studious fulfilment of daily chores. But the interesting thing is this seems to be a common language, spoken in many small, locally-owned establishments. There’s a lot to be said about cultivating that type of environment. It goes beyond insuring recurring business. Sure, it’s a common
understanding that it’s easier, cheaper and better to keep an existing customer than to make a new one. And all businesses, local or not, try to do this through some kind of relationship building using marketing, advertisements, commercials, door greeters, etc. But unfortunately, many of these relationships are one way - the sellers only want to know about customers superficially, demographically, so that they can more easily convince them to spend more money. But nothing about Monty Williamson is hollow. Jovial, knowledgeable, and slightly self-effacing when he feels like it, Monty has lived in Manhattan for fifty-nine years and been in the workforce since he was in the sixth grade (earning five dollars a week for sixty hours’ work some summers). He inherited an electrical contracting company from his father, decades ago and now he works with his own son as well. Though a bit older than when he worked on his grandfather’s farm, his work ethic is still intact; he still oversees two local businesses of
his own, ManKan Electrical Supply and Safe Storage, in addition to trading stocks online and traveling when he can with his wife, Karen. But Monty did his time in the corporate grindhouse as well, figuring out if that kind of life was right for him. Monty went to work for a division of General Motors right after he graduated college in January of 1965, and made up
his mind after only a year on the job. “You had to play the game all the time. You had to suit up, show up...You can no longer get out. And that was one of the things I liked, was being able to work with the tools.” And there’s really no mistaking how he closed that chapter: “When I left Indiana in December of ‘65, I burned every tie I owned.” After all the time he’s spent as an owner, as a contractor, as a bluecollar man of the people, Monty still has one basic principle, “The main thing is take care of the customer... as a rule, if I didn’t feel like that I could do them the best job they could get, then I’d send them someplace else. I’d just tell them I can’t do it... Trying to sell the shuck & jive doesn’t work.” To be honest, there’s not many businesses, large or small, that would allow that kind of bald honesty anymore. Fewer and fewer stories involve people like Monty behind a nice desk and a leather chair, being to the point and forthright. More and more news stories fea-
ture little boys and girls running around in suits too big for them, telling fibs and whoppers and trying to catch as many flies as they can with honey made from vinegar. So why did the honey matter? It is sweet, it is useful, it is nutritious. But honey is also medicine. It can actually help to heal. A little science to explain: as honey comes from the nectar of flowering plants, local honey is sourced from local plants, sometimes plants that can cause allergic reactions. If consumed regularly, the compounds in it become familiar to the body and prolonged consumption can stop triggering allergic reactions and in some cases even reverse sensitivities altogether. In short, sticking with local honey makes the consumer better connected to their world and ultimately less irritated, drippy and reactionary. After a while, we stopped having so much honey and started eating more white sugar. During most of my childhood, I never had any allergies. Now I know for sure I have at least three and some days I can’t even go outside without my eyes turning red and my nose leaking like a busted faucet. My diet altogether is generally worse, even though it’s much more convenient and significantly cheaper than it was before, when my veins ran gold and I had flowers in my blood. There are a lot of similarities between bees and their honey, and Manhattan and their locallyowned businesses. Both rely on a community of individuals mutually benefiting from working together. Both have their place in a larger structure of relationships that enable growth. Both produce wonderful things that can enrich the lives of whomever consumes them, and both can get dangerously close to disappearing entirely without the support of their local consumers.
www.thehypeweekly.com - September 1, 2011 - 5