Huntsville Business Journal

Hold on to your preconceived ideas of the need for a “brick and mortar” storefront operation.

With The Snail on the Wall bookstore, Huntsville’s Creative Entrepreneur of the Year winner, Lady Vowell Smith, has developed the perfect mix of online sales and pop-up events.

Smith, owner and founder of The Snail on the Wall bookstore, is a book aficionado with a Ph.D. in literature. She established The Snail on the Wall as a “bookstore without a store” in 2017, starting with a pop-up store at Randolph’s Under the Christmas Tree market.

With razor-thin margins on books, coupled with major competition from the “Big Box” bookstores, community bookstores have had a hard time surviving, even in the best of times.

Smith’s business model has low overhead and high flexibility, but also offers the same services that a “brick and mortar” independent bookstore would customarily provide: a curated selection of books, personal recommendations, gifts for readers, author events, and community partnerships with schools, organizations, and businesses.

A lack of small local independent bookstores – a place where readers and authors could meet and share ideas is what prompted the creation of The Snail on the Wall, she said.

“I knew that Huntsville was missing out on nationally known authors coming to our city,” said Smith. “They were stopping in Birmingham, Nashville, Atlanta, and every place around us because they had independent bookstores and Huntsville didn’t.

“I didn’t know anything about bookselling, so I thought I would experiment with a ‘store without a store.’ Then, once the model started, the delivery service worked, and it reaches more people than it would if it were in one fixed location.”

During a pandemic in full swing, bookstores around the country are struggling, just like other small businesses.

“I don’t want to say business is better because when I compare it, it’s different,” said Smith. “I’m probably working harder for less; everything is just a little bit harder right now.”

Otherwise, business is good. “It’s going really well for the holidays, it’s extremely busy, a lot busier,” said Smith. “With COVID, a lot of people discovered my business because it has a delivery service. Books were one of the things that were so popular when we were all staying at home. I do think a lot of people discovered The Snail on the Wall as a ‘delivery to your doorstep with no contact’ delivery.”

The Snail on the Wall has hosted several large events in the Thurber Arts Center at the Randolph School in partnership with the Huntsville Library Foundation.

As a key component of Smith’s bookstore business model, author events are something that have been sorely missed. Author events draw in big crowds.

In March, The Snail on the Wall hosted “Sean of the South,” author and podcaster Sean Dietrich. Last year, it was former journalist turned author Lisa Wingate.

“We had 275 people for Lisa Wingate, 300 people for Shawn of the South,” said Smith.

Smith has hosted events at a variety of places, including breweries, such as Fractal and OTBX, which helps to promote the wide assortment of partnerships. Last November, in partnership with Rocket City Mom, The Snail on the Wall hosted Ann Vogel, a nationally known podcaster and author, at the Stone Event Center,

“I often try look for partners when I do an event because it increases the reach,” said Smith. “That’s been part of the Snail’s business from the start, to partner with other businesses. Find places to pop up, find places to do events, that kind of thing.

“I’ve hosted at Roosevelt & Co. (on Clinton Avenue), which is where my pop-up store is right now. This is the third year that I’ve done a holiday pop-up store through the whole month of December. I have it all set up and people can come shop anytime.”

Smith said she values the collaboration that comes with partnership.

“It’s really the only way I could have done this non-traditional business model and the only way it would probably work, not just to get the word out, but to help with the logistics and the venues,” she said. “Most of the places and partners have found that it’s just as beneficial for them, if not more.

“Because of COVID, there is a lot of awareness that we need to support small businesses. I do think people are shopping small when they can.”

There are 60 days of summer wedged in between the end of the 2020 school year and the beginning of the new 2020-21 school year.

For working parents who rely on summer camps for childcare during summer break, not sending their children to summer camp is simply not an option for them.

Stephenie Walker, managing editor of Rocket City Mom, a Huntsville-based internet media company that helps parents and new families to the city, find and share information about Huntsville and the surrounding area, said the number one question parents and families are asking in the wake of an unprecedented spring disrupted by the coronavirus pandemic, is whether summer camps are going to happen this year.

“Anyone who has followed our seasonal activity guides released every spring, summer, winter and fall for the past 10 years knows we usually cover musical events, festivals, movies, camps, et cetera,” said Walker on a teleconference call with the Huntsville-Madison County Chamber of Commerce. “But this is an unusual summer and many of those things are closed due to the pandemic.”

In fact, while the Summer Teen Volunteer Programs across the city have been mostly cancelled, there are still several arts and education-related camps, some of them virtual, still active.

In the sports and fitness camp arena, Row Huntsville Watersports camps and the Rocket City Swim League camps are still on; the popular YMCA Camp Cha-La-Kee overnight camping and Burritt Nature rangers Day Camp is taking reservations; and some Vacation Bible School camps are still active.

The CyberProtex “Get Into the Game” introduction to cyber security camp for ages 11 to 15 is on, as are Huntsville STEAM Works and Huntsville City Schools’ virtual camps. Space Camp and Robotics Camp are tentatively starting up in late June, and the new Rocket City Trash Pandas may not have started their long awaited minor league baseball season, but they are moving forward with their Day Camp at Toyota Field.

“We are excited the Trash Pandas are giving the community what they have asked for and we expect some very creative ideas to be coming out of that organization this summer,” said Walker.

“Overall, we had to pivot from business-based events and come up with a guide that covers the limited number of summer activities still out there, while offering parents creative alternatives that will prevent boredom and get kids away from their device screens. Essentially we needed to come up with something that would help parents and families survive Summer 2020.”

While brainstorming with her business partner and founder of Rocket City Mom, Jennifer Breuer, they recalled the many times they heard parents reminisce during normal times about the days of their own childhood summers when they entertained themselves by riding bikes, climbing trees, running and jumping and playing Fort or King of the Hill.

“This is that summer!” Walker said.

From that concept, they pulled together a summer activity guide that can be found on the homepage of their website at RocketCityMom.com.

“We have tried to offer multiple recommendations for every day of those 60 days until school starts back, and you will find some events that can be done from home or online, while others are real life events away from home, but still in compliance with CDC guidelines for safe social distancing,” Walker said.

Rocketcitymom.com began as a Mom Blog in 2010 when Breuer’s husband relocated the family to Huntsville. They had a daughter who was just a toddler at the time, and they didn’t know anyone in Huntsville and had no family in the area to rely on for information. Breuer and her child began exploring the area on their own and Jennifer began blogging about it.

Take a day out to do some creek stomping! (Photo/RocketCityMom.com)

Four months into the blog project, Jennifer met Stephenie Walker. Walker has lived in Madison County most of her life and knew the community having worked at the Huntsville-Madison County Public Library and being involved in community projects.

The two had a simpatico perspective on things – Breuer knew what new Huntsville moms needed and Walker knew what was available. They began collaborating and, today, RocketCityMom.com provides a perspective and detailed information about Huntsville and Madison happenings, as well as where new families to the area can find products, services and activities.

“This year we put together all the different activities you can do while safely social distancing, from water parks, splashpads, swimming pools and swimming lessons, to hiking, camping, horseback riding, disc golf and visiting waterfalls, parks and playgrounds,” she said.

Some of the highlights from the guide include Creek Stomping. It is free and open to the public and Rocket City Mom provides a guide with plenty of tips on how to do it right.

You start with a creek such as the Indian Creek Greenway, the Alum Hollow Trail on Green Mountain, the Hays Nature Preserve, or the Mill Creek Greenway in Madison to name a few; and then you go stomp around it. You can wear a pair of rainboots, duck shoes, water shoes, sandals, or just go barefoot. Popular sidelines include skipping stones, building dams with rocks and sticks, searching for crawdads, and netting small fish.

The guide also recommends provisions for this activity like plenty of bug repellent, sunscreen, a net, a side of dry clothes and plenty of towels.

“The Land Trust takes care of a lot of the outdoor spaces where you can enjoy these activities so we always advise visitors to leave our outdoor spaces in better condition than how you found them,” Walker said. “Pick up your trash and make sure you don’t disrupt the ecosystem. Teaching children this is in itself an educational experience.”

While Point Mallard is currently closed, splashpads at Bicentennial Park, Everybody Can Play on Drake Avenue, and Hogan YMCA are open.

“It’s a great way to go out and cool down and it doesn’t cost a thing,” said Walker.

There is a Civil Rights driving tour that is very timely and will help put what the country’s going through today into its proper context.

The Huntsville-Madison County Public Library’s annual Summer Reading program is still happening in a slightly different way. Parents and their kids can go by and pick up their summer reading packets and in it are reading logs. The library is giving out prizes to kids who meet their goals and those goals are customizable to every child’s reading level.

“Summer reading is something to do and your child will be much better equipped with less ground to recover when school starts back in August if they keep reading all summer long,” said Walker. “It is easier to get some kids to read than others, but if you talk to your local librarian, they are very clever and have many ways to get even the most reluctant readers to pick up a couple of books.”

Furthermore, almost all the area’s farmer’s markets and Community-supported Agriculture are open and dozens of area orchards, U-Picks, and roadside stands are open throughout the summer, providing a tantalizing experience for kids and families.

Finally, Rocket City Mom has introduced a new category of fun this summer. The Summer Bucket List is a printable checklist of 61 days of items designed to get bored kids thinking about socially distant things they can do like catching fireflies, building a kinetic sand castle, organizing a water balloon Olympics, or making a themed dinner for their family.

“We felt we needed to provide a good mix of things you can do at home, and out in the community. This way we are providing our readers what they are looking for. That’s what we do best,” said Walker. “Give working parents and their families an event calendar of things to do together.

“Hopefully, everyone can find what they are looking for this summer.”