LOWELL, Mich. — TikTok isn't just about entertainment; it's become people's livelihoods. One Lowell bookstore owner explained that if it weren't for the app, she wouldn't be here today.
“I wish that I would have gotten on there sooner, because we found a really great audience and a really great community,” Bettie’s Pages Owner Nicole Lintemuth said.
The bookstore opened in downtown Lowell back in 2020.
“When we opened up right at the start of COVID, we immediately shut down,” Nicole said. “Nobody even knew that we were there yet, and we already had to shut down and couldn't have people shopping in store.”
A year after opening, this owner took to TikTok.
“I thought I was too old to do TikTok. It wasn't for me, but a friend of mine convinced me that it was worth it, so I hopped on there.”
This business owner has a couple hundred videos sharing information about what’s in her store.
“So we're an indie bookstore. We're all ages, all genres, but we have a particular focus on making sure that diversity is represented on the shelf,” Nicole said.
She also shares information about what is going on in her community.
“I think it was early 2021, and it was just at a time where it was really important for me to talk about things like banned books and the diverse books that we do,” Nicole said. “I was lucky enough to go viral, and [TikTok] kind of really made a huge difference to our business.”
Those views also help in sales.
“We will see that bump hit in our online sales traffic. ... We've had things; we do mystery boxes,” Nicole said.
This business owner says what TikTok has done for her is no mystery after moving to a larger location in the Lowell area.
“I don’t think that we would be here honestly. You know, the last couple of years have been really rough on retail,” she added. “A lot of our stock is banned books. The books that are most often banned or challenged are books with Black, Indigenous or other people of color as characters or authors and LGBTQ representation.”
She hopes this platform will remain, but she is already directing people to her other social media sites. Nicole says that if you want to stay up-to-date with what's happening at the bookstore, you can sign up for their newsletter.
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