Business Photography in Holland | Reader's World Celebrates 50 Year Anniversary
Having a degree in History means I read a lot in college. I read even more now.
To say I'm a sucker for books is an understatement.
That's why I was excited to work with Reader's World in Holland, MI and Local First to create portraits that featured the family who has owned the business the past 50 years and some of their favorite customers. Reader's World was founded in 1967 by current owner Lisa Hungerink's Grandfather, Chris DeVries, and her parents, Bob and Laurie Hungerink.
To begin the project, I connected with Lisa at her bookstore in Holland. She told me stories about growing up in the store and watching newspapers fly off the shelves every single day (since they were open 9am to 9pm, 365 days a year) and getting to know customers by name (and then their children's names).
While the book world certainly has changed, Reader's World still offers a great selection of books and Lisa is extremely proud of the magazine selection they have to offer their customers.
With those two ideas in mind, I came up with the idea of shooting a simple portrait of Lisa, doing what's done since she was a child, putting books on the shelf and taking them down.
Next, Lisa invited some of her best and brightest customers to the store for our time together. Isabella and Adrian Cooney, brother and sister from the Holland area, are regulars with their parents to the store.
During their time in the store, I only took photos of each of them for about 10 minutes, but they hung around begging their dad for another book to read for the summer. Dad's response: "You already reached your new book allotment for the month..."
Priceless.
Lisa also invited one her regular magazine customers, Mark Roth to the store for the shoot. Mark told me tales about Lisa pulling out specific magazines while he wasn't there, putting them in a stack and then telling him she had new things for him to browse.
I could tell that Lisa really knew what Mark wanted to get out of the magazines he purchased (he's a product engineer and is looking for visual and mechanical inspiration for new products at work and at home).
If your business has a milestone celebration or simply needs someone to tell your story in a visual way (photo or video), please let me know. Send an email or use the Book Us link below to reach out.
We love collaborating with business owners, like Reader's World and organizations, like Local First, to brainstorm new and exciting ways to tell you about businesses that everyone should be visiting!