The Midwest Indie Bookstore Roadmap (and everything it inspired!)

The Midwest Indie Bookstore Roadmap generates a sense of pride and excitement to see so many thriving bookstores showcased in one place. It perfectly celebrates our vision statement as an organization: "We envision a region full of communities with thriving, vibrant independent bookstores.”
With shelter-in-place mandates active throughout the pandemic, we delayed the release of our print roadmap for one year. Instead, we made good use of the roadmap assets in a cluster of creative ways, transforming our vision of what the roadmap is and what it can do for our members.

Below is an overview of the latest and greatest assets the roadmap currently offers. To everyone's delight, the print roadmap will be back on April 24, 2021.

Roadmap (print and online)

The roadmap is a beautiful full-color art print designed as an old-school multi-folded paper roadmap. It features custom illustrations all the members bookstores in our region one one side, and a bookstore index with exciting publisher promotions on the back. The full map is 22" x 28" and folds to 4.5" x 7", and includes a year-long social media-based contest for customers. ​Explore #bookstoreroadmap on Twitter to see more.

How do I get on the map?
Each year, submitting your membership dues by the deadline automatically triggers the custom art and inclusion in the roadmap. You don't have to do anything else. Every member store is shipped 400 copies for free. 
Click above to reserve your spot on the Midwest Indie Bookstore Roadmap and Shopping Guide.

Custom store art

If your store is already on the map, a simple png is available for free. In addition, you have two upgrade options: 1) a vector package, which allows for more extensive manipulation and 2) ​a stylized badge with your store's info. You can also request custom safe-shopping graphics for all social media platforms.
Click above to learn how to use your store's unique artwork and access your free PNG.

Midwest Indie Bookstore Shopping Guide - New!

The Midwest Indie Bookstore Shopping Guide is a fun and interactive consumer-facing tool that consists of two main features
  1. The bookstore gallery, featuring a dedicated listing for each of our member stores that directs customers to your in-person and online shopping options. See an example page here.
  2. The roadmap, hosted online, it can be enlarged and examined, and customers can "cruise around" the Midwest and build bookstores into trip plans (which people often say they do!). When the new roadmap is released in April, every store on the online roadmap will be hyperlinked to that store's website