Business Profile: Bruised Apple Books and Music, Peekskill
Peekskill resident Scott Sailor, owner of Bruised Apple Books and Music, which opened in the city in 1993.
Photo credit: Neal Rentz
Peekskill resident Scott Sailor recalled last week he has been collecting books for three decades.
His passion translated into a business as he opened Bruised Apple Books and Music on Central Avenue in Peekskill in 1993, which offers used and rare items.
“I was just hunting around for a place to open up my shop and I considered a number of places out west and other areas of the county that I’d seen in my travels and somebody suggested Peekskill,” Sailor said. “I grew up in northern New Jersey so it wasn’t too far of a drive. I’d never been here before. I never ever heard of it before. And I drove up and just kind of fell in love with the geography of the area immediately.”
Sailor said he worked for six months to renovate the vacant property that he rented and he lived on the floor of the facility while doing much of the work himself. He filled his new store with books he had collected for the previous seven years. He later added additional music to his store in the form of records, CDs and DVDs.
The idea of owning a store was something that interested him since he was a youth, Sailor said. He had family members who owned an antique and gift shop in Canada. Sailor said his love of books was developed in college where he studied English literature.
“I spent a lot of time going to other people’s bookstores,” he said.
Sailor also spent much time purchasing books. “Once I decided I was going to open a bookstore I just started rummaging through thrift stores, going to garage sales, going to library book sales, wherever I could find books that were cheap,” he said. “I would learn through the process while doing that which books were worth hanging on to and which weren’t because initially I bought a lot of stuff that wasn’t so great.”
Sailor said he also learned much from book dealers and others working in the industry who like him sought books for their stores.
Bruised Apple offers a wide variety of items. “I’ve got at least 200 subject headings,” Sailor said. “It’s pretty well organized. The aisles are pretty wide so it’s not claustrophobic like a lot of used book stores are.”
Sailor said the name of his store came about indirectly by a friend who helped him with the opening of the store. The friend had a sister who moved to the State of Washington. His friend’s brother-in-law was eating an apparently bruised apple on the orchard they were living on and said, ‘How about Bruised Apple?” Sailor recalled, “As soon as I heard it I said that’s perfect.” .
Sailor said he welcomes having his customers spending long periods reading his books. “It’s set up for browsing and hanging out,” he said.
Bruised Apple has to compete with Amazon and other on-line sellers. “I guess we compete by just being an interesting sort of cozy, charming brick and mortar place. People don’t want to just stay home all the time,” he said. “I order books on Amazon sometime too when I don’t have the patience to wait for them to show up here. But I also like to just go in a shop and look around and find things I didn’t know I was looking for that end up becoming sometimes even life-changing.”
Bruised Apple Books and Music is located at 923 Central Ave. in Peekskill. For more information call 914-734-7000 or visit bruisedapplebooks.com.
