OCEAN CITY — Wood Robinson has spent the past half-century selling new and used books from his shop at 1052 Asbury Ave.
After achieving the significant milestone, the bibliophile and entrepreneur is finally ready to take some time to relax and do some reading.
Robinson and wife Debbie Rosander initially rented the building in 1976, moving into the attached apartment, where they raised their children before moving to bigger digs at Fourth Street and Bay Avenue.
They raised Steven and Leslie in the city by the sea, and now their daughter has returned to the town she loves to take over operation of the store and raise her own children on the island.
Robinson recently told the Sentinel that he got started in the book business by chance after a friend opened a store in Newark, Del., called the Bookateria. After a couple of years, the friend had enough inventory to sell some to Robinson, so he opened the Bookateria Two.
In the beginning, the couple, who met at Ursinus College, ran the book store only in the summer and worked other jobs through the rest of the year. Rosander studied to become a teacher.
She said the biggest change is the price of books, which are always half-price for used and 15 percent of new.
“Books were about 90 cents, expensive ones were $2.50,” she said of when they opened.
Rosander said part of the reason they have been so successful is that books are expensive, so people bring in old books to trade and they sell them for half-price.
Used books were their primary market in the beginning.
“We didn’t carry new books, but we never had children’s books and best sellers, so we started with some new books,” she said, noting they sold best-sellers for 25 to 30 years, adding more in the 1990s when Atlantic Books on the boardwalk went out of business because no one else in town was selling them.
Through five decades of selling books, Robinson’s favorite part remains “matching people up with books.”
“The best things is, someone brings in books and says they read this guy, this guy, this guy, and I can recommend some authors they have not thought of,” he said.
He also likes carrying books that are out of print and hard to find elsewhere.
Rosander said they enjoy seeing patrons who recall visiting the store with their parents who are now bringing their own children.
“We are getting generations of families,” she said.
They also have had meaningful relationships with their employees over the years. Three of the women have worked there for 15 to 20 years.
“It’s been so rewarding to have employees that you trust, know our customers,” Rosander said, noting it “has been a lot easier to transition out knowing they are in capable hands.”
While book stores are becoming increasingly hard to find, as Ebooks and audio books rise in popularity and other forms of entertainment pose stiff competition, Rosander said there is still a segment of the population that wants to hold a book in their hands on the beach.
That’s where daughter Leslie Dosunmu enters the picture.
The 2004 Ocean City High School graduate “has always been a beach girl, loves Ocean City,” Rosander said. “It seemed like the right opportunity for her.”
Dosunmu and her husband, Deji, brought daughter Zoe, 2, to their new home on the island and quickly added a son to the family.
They relocated from Bryn Mawr, Pa., to be close to her parents and raise their children here.
The goal, she said, is to keep the used bookstore up and running.
“Dad has been keeping it running for 50 years, a huge milestone, and I want to honor what he started,” she said, noting she also loves reading. “If we can revamp some of the marketing strategies, it has a good model and I think there is a market out there.”
While she acknowledged that new books can be purchased even at department stores, she said wandering the aisles of a book store and talking with workers knowledgable about authors and genre is part of the journey.
“You may find something you really like, but you don’t know unless you stumble across it and pick it up,” Dosunmu said.
So, as she transitions into operating the bookstore and living at the shore, she is fortunate that her parents will be around to help ease her into the position.
“I will need their support and guidance,” she said.
– By CRAIG D. SCHENCK/Sentinel staff