Books Not Bans raised its first round of funds quite by accident. I had gotten fiscal sponsorship from a local arts organization specifically so that I could apply for a local grant, which we did not receive in 2024. However, a couple of months later, Books Not Bans was featured in the Los Angeles Times on the front page, covered in CBS national news, and mentioned by several other media outlets. From that, I received over $25,000 in unexpected donations from around the world. I also received a local grant for $3000.
Prior to this, I had gotten donations of books and money for shipping directly from bookstore customers, mainly at Fabulosa Books in the Castro. I’d shipped 500 books before getting a fiscal sponsor or cash donations, with almost no promotion.
The local reading community deeply cares about this project, and we are harnessing this
emotional investment into consistent engagement. We are developing a fundraising plan that is rooted in regularly scheduled community events, semi-annual splashy parties, and
communications. We create environments that push beyond author readings and book clubs to generate shared spaces which highlight literature.
For 2025, we aim to launch our first local fundraising efforts after completing our first quarter goal of sending 1000 books to PFLAG chapters. We expect to be able to raise at least $10,000 in cash donations in 2025, in addition to book donations by bookstore customers and publishers. We have approximately $10,000 on hand as of January 2025.
We have already started to have a robust online presence. Our social media has been growing steadily, views of our videos regularly exceed our follow numbers, and we recently launched a Substack. A volunteer is working with us on turning that into donations, and another volunteer has committed to sending monthly newsletters. Local media regularly runs our press releases, and the public responds by showing up.
I have a long history of community activism in San Francisco, and a large network which I have yet to fully tap into. I currently run events at Fabulosa, where Books Not Bans originated, and previously founded and ran a small business. I’ve run hundreds of events, and I know that the key to growing a thriving community is persistence and promotion.
Books Not Bans is not an expensive project to run, and can scale up or down as the budget
allows. Our core mission - sending books and hosting events - can be accomplished for just a few hundred dollars a month. In a short time, we believe we can reliably bring in over a
thousand dollars a month.
We believe that a year from now, we will be able to hire a part time employee for administrative tasks. In the long term, we would like to be able to hold large events on a quarterly basis. All of this will help us send more queer books to the people who need them most, and build our community of book lovers here in the Bay.
