Crowdfunding campaigns run on the idea that we should all help each other. Whether it’s a GoFundMe to help a church school recover from a fire or a Kickstarter to fund the publication of a book, they are all based on this idea. It’s a core belief that helping one another is a fundamental good, and we believe it here at Path To Publishing.
That’s why Nia-Tayler Clark, owner of the Black-owned independent bookstore Blacklit in Texas, turned to crowdfunding on I Fund Women when she found herself faced with an eviction notice and different locks on the door of her store. Although she had leased the space four months earlier, she had yet to be able to open to the public and had fallen behind on her bills.
She needed $27,000 in ten days to be able to keep her store. By the time the campaign closed, she had raised just over $50,000.
Blacklit began as a subscription service in 2019 and expanded to a brick-and-mortar in 2022 with the goal to "curate an in-person experience where Black literature, Black excellence and Black culture can be taught, explored and celebrated."
Thanks to those who believed in helping others, that goal is still attainable. Path To Publishing is proud to have supported this campaign to help Ms. Clark get the new keys to her place and keep her store alive—to be a part of this rising tide, because the success of Blacklit’s mission is part of the success of our mission as well.
This belief is also why we chose to start a crowdfunding campaign to not just help us publish a book but start a movement around The Price We Pay, the inaugural publication of our traditional publishing imprint, PTP Press.
We want to invite others to join the movement with our novel approach to changing the conversation around race relations in this country. We want to invite others to become a part of the rising tide that will see The Price We Paypublished and released to everyone who will not just want but need to read it.
Want to know more? You can sign up here to receive our emails about the book, the campaign, the movement, and what all of us can do to help ourselves and others.