Blog post from BWB CEO, David Murphy.

People ask me all the time what does it really mean when you say “Better World Books delivers meaningful social and environmental impact” through its core business?

On one level, we can cite several meaningful metrics that we use to track our impact:

• Over $9 million raised for our non-profit literacy and library partners
• Over 4.5 million books donated to a large number of non-profit partners, most notably Books For Africa and Feed The Children
• Over 70 million pounds of books saved from landfills through the re-use or recycling of used books we have collected.

On another level, it is all about the stories.  Stories of our employees and our partners advancing our mission in so many different ways.  Here are just a few of them:

Earth Week (April 18th)

• Several employees from our corporate headquarters in Alpharetta, GA volunteered to help clear hiking trails at the Blue Heron Nature Preserve. Everyone returned home poison ivy and tick-free!!
• Over 60 BWB employees participated in the Indiana Highway’s Trash Bash month! These employees from Mishawaka and South Bend did their part by picking up trash along the side of our section of adopted highway, Capital Avenue. We’re glad to be able to do our small part to keep our earth green!

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*Note* The below blog post is a guest blog from author Alvin Townley. This content does not necessarily reflect the views of Better World Books. We love having expert guest bloggers and invite you to email 11@betterworldbooks.com if you are interested in covering a book or topic on the BWB Blog. Alvin is the author of Fly Navy. Thank you, Alvin!

Memorial Day weekend always marks the beginning of summer and typically means time outside, under the sun, and perhaps on the water.  This year, I aim to do all three… but after my adventures of the past year, I’ll view the weekend and its Monday holiday in a different way.

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Can you imagine reciting Shakespeare by heart in the 3rd grade?

Robinson Shakespeare Company from Better World Books on Vimeo.

In 2008, Christy Burgess founded the Robinson Shakespeare Company at our first-ever literacy partner, the Robinson Community Learning Center in South Bend, Indiana.

Ever since their first performance, Macbeth, there has been huge success and buy in with students and parents. The Shakespeare Company works with youth in 3rd-12th grades.

Right now, the Company is working on The Tempest. The young actors are donating half of the proceeds from the play to Tsunami relief in Japan.

Not only is the program fun, it is also successful! In the English Speaking Union Shakespeare Monologue Competition, the Robinson actors won 1st place in each category in 2009 and in 2010 won five out of six. They also have placed in the top three in state every year they have participated.

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Here is a collection of sweet Mother’s Day book stories from our staff and online friends…

From Mary Olson, BWB’s Outlet Store Manager -

“I recently read The Eyre Affair by Jasper Fforde (the beginning of the Thursday Next series, which I highly recommend!). Thursday Next, the heroine of the story, is a character in the ‘real’ world who gets to cross over into the fictional world. During the course of the story she interacts within the classic, Jane Eyre, and the reader gets to see parts of the classic play out from Thursday’s perspective within the fictional world.

As I was reading, the story brought back memories of scenes from Jane Eyre, the movie, that I had watched with my mother when I was a little kid. There was so much I didn’t understand about the story, and I remember asking my mom to explain so many things. I was too young to read the book then, but after reading The Eyre Affair, I picked up Jane Eyre for the first time and absolutely loved it. Reading has always been important to my mom, an English professor; and that’s a priority she has passed on to me since childhood. Now we get to share books and recommend titles to each other and dialog and argue about different characters, plot lines, and deeper meanings; our intellectual interaction is a part of our ongoing relationship we both sincerely enjoy.

Reading through Jane Eyre, a story with such a strong and independent woman, reminded me of all of the mothers in my family: my Great Grandma Bradley (who lived to be just over 100!), my Grandma Mayes, my Grandma Olson, and my mother. I am blessed to have had so many remarkable women in my life, and I am proud of the heritage I have in my family because of them.”

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Former slave and abolitionist writer Frederick Douglass said “It is easier to build strong children than to repair broken men.” In a society today dominated by TV shows, video games and computer screens, we are so excited to be celebrating the 92nd Annual Children’s Book Week with you! Books open the door to imagination and education for our children. They help us build strong children together – and to fulfill the dreams of heroes such as Douglass.

We asked our awesome Facebook friends and Twitter followers about their favorite children’s books from back in the day. The response was amazing, thank you for sharing! You guys obviously <3 books like we do! Here are some of their most cherished childhood reads:

‎A Wrinkle in Time - Torri S.
Rapunzel – Lise K.
Dr Seuss – Angela O.
Alice in Wonderland - Julie E.

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