Dear Friends;
Sometimes no matter how many ways we hope, things just don’t turn out the way we wished they would. We came really, really close to handing The Wild off to the perfect family, but in the end balancing the needs of an independent bookstore with those of their family was too much. And you can’t blame folks for wanting to take care of what is most important to us all.
So, Monday, March 15th will be the final day of regular operation for The Wild. For the next six days most things will be the same. We’ll keep normal hours + Sunday: Mon-Fri 10am-6pm; Saturday 10am-5pm; Sunday noon-4. We’ll have story time on Friday at 10:30, just like always.
What’s different? 1. All merchandise is 20% off (unless marked down even more). 2. Everything that isn’t nailed down is for sale. Always wanted your own spinning puzzle rack? The ability to store several hundred placemats? How about the stump Ms. Jane sat on to read more than 1500 stories? It can all be yours.
What’s not for sale? Pages, Bunnicula, Toad, Thelma and Hannah.
See you soon!
The Mills Family
The Wild
Wednesday, March 10, 2010
Thursday, February 18, 2010
Wild Status Update
February 17, 2010
Dear Friends,
Today a good thing happened. A local family with a passion for literature and learning came forward with serious, substantiated interest in owning The Wild. In the coming month, they will take our store for a test drive while making their final decision.
What does this mean exactly? It means we will stay open, operating as we always have (Pages in the window and Jane on the story time stage), for the next 30 days. At the end of that time, we will either celebrate the passing of The Wild torch or the good times we have all had together during the past four-and-a-half years. No matter where we go from here, you will be the first to know.
Our sincere thanks for your continued support,
Jane, Ernie & Fritz
The Wild
884 Logan Street
Noblesville, IN 46060
317-773-0920
Dear Friends,
Today a good thing happened. A local family with a passion for literature and learning came forward with serious, substantiated interest in owning The Wild. In the coming month, they will take our store for a test drive while making their final decision.
What does this mean exactly? It means we will stay open, operating as we always have (Pages in the window and Jane on the story time stage), for the next 30 days. At the end of that time, we will either celebrate the passing of The Wild torch or the good times we have all had together during the past four-and-a-half years. No matter where we go from here, you will be the first to know.
Our sincere thanks for your continued support,
Jane, Ernie & Fritz
The Wild
884 Logan Street
Noblesville, IN 46060
317-773-0920
Monday, January 25, 2010
Wild for Sale
Dear Friends,
The Perfect Storm of circumstances, some predictable and some personal, has forced us to make a very difficult decision. We have made the The Wild available for sale. If no buyer is found by February’s end, we will close.
When we opened The Wild in 2005, we had a most romantic vision for what it would be. After more than four years, the reality is that it became more than we had ever dreamed and one of our most personally gratifying experiences yet.
Together, with you, we have:
--Read more than 1500 stories together
--Hatched 7 healthy baby chicks
--Collected and delivered enough peanut butter and jelly to Horizon House homeless shelter to make 1800 sandwiches for people in need
--Completed so many craft projects that we stopped counting around 10,000
--Eaten 1.35 Dum Dums for every completed craft project
--Through OLG and St. Paul’s Church, donated thousands of books to children in Appalachia, many of whom had never owned a book of their own
--Graduated more than 120 students from ukulele classes
--Given $30,000 in discounts to local teachers and schools
--Learned to knit, paint, sculpt, needle felt, cook, properly brush our teeth, safely approach dogs, write stories and poetry
--Helped grow the collection of library books at New Britton Elementary in memory of Wild Child Katie McGee who lost her battle with leukemia in July of ’08 at the age of 9.
--Displayed the art of at least 200 young artists
--Decorated more than 600 cookies and 360 eggs, made a home for fairies, tutus for dancing, pirate chests for burying and one of the coolest trash art robots ever
--Enjoyed the company of visiting snakes, trained dogs, potbellied pigs and dancing chickens—all of whom were almost as fabulous as the humans who shared them with us
--Raised more than $20,000 for the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation to help find a cure for CF, in hopes of giving 30,000 kids across the country a chance at a future
--Met countless authors and illustrators
--Kicked up our heels for the Breaking of Dawn, the Dog Days, the Deathly Hallows, Five Ancestors, Rattlesnake Season, The End, The Last Olympian and the Son of Promise
--And, perhaps most importantly, taught one another by sharing our differences
Thank you for buying a book from us when you could have gotten it someplace else. Thank you for your stories and your friendship, for your loyalty and support. We have taken it all in and have been honored to be part of your lives during the best and worst of times.
There are a number of you who deserve a personal thank you. For fear of leaving out a name, if you are an artist, author, teacher, musician, mom, dad, firefighter, librarian, dentist, veterinarian, grandma, grandpa, scout leader, historian, 4-Her, chef, dinosaur hunter, herpetologist, farmer or friend who has taken the time to share your passion or your craft with our young Wild kids, please accept our sincerest thanks. To our employees, all three of you, you have become and will always be considered family.
Our plan was to leave the world a better place when we finished than it was when we started. Together, we did just that.
With Sincere Gratitude,
Jane, Ernie and Fritz Mills
The Wild
884 Logan Street
Noblesville, IN 46060
The Perfect Storm of circumstances, some predictable and some personal, has forced us to make a very difficult decision. We have made the The Wild available for sale. If no buyer is found by February’s end, we will close.
When we opened The Wild in 2005, we had a most romantic vision for what it would be. After more than four years, the reality is that it became more than we had ever dreamed and one of our most personally gratifying experiences yet.
Together, with you, we have:
--Read more than 1500 stories together
--Hatched 7 healthy baby chicks
--Collected and delivered enough peanut butter and jelly to Horizon House homeless shelter to make 1800 sandwiches for people in need
--Completed so many craft projects that we stopped counting around 10,000
--Eaten 1.35 Dum Dums for every completed craft project
--Through OLG and St. Paul’s Church, donated thousands of books to children in Appalachia, many of whom had never owned a book of their own
--Graduated more than 120 students from ukulele classes
--Given $30,000 in discounts to local teachers and schools
--Learned to knit, paint, sculpt, needle felt, cook, properly brush our teeth, safely approach dogs, write stories and poetry
--Helped grow the collection of library books at New Britton Elementary in memory of Wild Child Katie McGee who lost her battle with leukemia in July of ’08 at the age of 9.
--Displayed the art of at least 200 young artists
--Decorated more than 600 cookies and 360 eggs, made a home for fairies, tutus for dancing, pirate chests for burying and one of the coolest trash art robots ever
--Enjoyed the company of visiting snakes, trained dogs, potbellied pigs and dancing chickens—all of whom were almost as fabulous as the humans who shared them with us
--Raised more than $20,000 for the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation to help find a cure for CF, in hopes of giving 30,000 kids across the country a chance at a future
--Met countless authors and illustrators
--Kicked up our heels for the Breaking of Dawn, the Dog Days, the Deathly Hallows, Five Ancestors, Rattlesnake Season, The End, The Last Olympian and the Son of Promise
--And, perhaps most importantly, taught one another by sharing our differences
Thank you for buying a book from us when you could have gotten it someplace else. Thank you for your stories and your friendship, for your loyalty and support. We have taken it all in and have been honored to be part of your lives during the best and worst of times.
There are a number of you who deserve a personal thank you. For fear of leaving out a name, if you are an artist, author, teacher, musician, mom, dad, firefighter, librarian, dentist, veterinarian, grandma, grandpa, scout leader, historian, 4-Her, chef, dinosaur hunter, herpetologist, farmer or friend who has taken the time to share your passion or your craft with our young Wild kids, please accept our sincerest thanks. To our employees, all three of you, you have become and will always be considered family.
Our plan was to leave the world a better place when we finished than it was when we started. Together, we did just that.
With Sincere Gratitude,
Jane, Ernie and Fritz Mills
The Wild
884 Logan Street
Noblesville, IN 46060
Friday, June 12, 2009
Time For Honesty
You know us. We've always made a point of being positive in The Wild.
Since it opened in 2005, our store has been one built on a philosophy of inclusion, tolerance, acceptance and subsequent creativity. Our goal was to open the kind of place that would contribute to our community in a way that leaves folks better off for having experienced it.
So when the economy started to nose dive this time last year, we didn't complain. When it continued a downward spiral into the fall and we started to watch the weakening of our neighborhood's small businesses, we threw our shoulders back, determined to dig our heels in.
When the New Year came and went and people started to ask how we were doing, we smiled, nodded and explained that we're way too stubborn to let all of this get the best of us.
But from the front door of The Wild, we can now see 10 vacant storefronts. That should be relatively easy for everyone to see. It should be cause for thought about where we as a community are placing our dollars. We considered e-mailing our Wild family earlier than now, reminding folks to think of their purchases as though they were votes--votes to keep their favorite places in tact. We didn't because we didn't want to seem self-righteous or preachy.
But then came word that this week alone, at least 4 more independent bookstores are closing:
Shaman Drum Bookshop, Ann Arbor, MI; 30 years old
Conkey’s Bookstore, Appleton, WI; 113 years old
Babylon Falling, San Francisco, CA; 2 years old
Hidden Room Book Shoppe, South Haven, MI
We can place blame on the big box stores, internet competition, shrinking school budgets, weak business plans and more, but the bottom line is this: fewer and fewer people are stepping up to the counter in independent stores and spending their money. People like the idea of having independent shops in their town. And in their defense, maybe they think someone else will spend enough to keep things going. Maybe they think that most business owners must be wealthy or they wouldn't be business owners in the first place. Maybe they think that because we're always positive and energetic, things must be okay.
Whatever the justification, the truth is simple and it is this: we are the only ones who can save the independents. If we commit ourselves to being deliberate with our business, this time next year we might still be able to order our favorite dish in our favorite restaurant, pick up our favorite microbrew at our favorite neighborhood pub, grab a unique piece of jewelry at our favorite boutique, enjoy a coffee at our corner coffee shop and, yes, drop by our favorite bookstore for story time or recommendations for great reads. If we continue to chase the deepest discounts and the biggest parking lots, we will be left with big boxes, mediocre products and no service.
Sean Stewart, owner of the closing Babylon Falling, said this in his blog:
"My worry for the future of bookselling is not what people are buying or even the amount they are buying, but rather how they are buying," wrote Stewart. "The idea of the bookseller in a curatorial role as a member of the community seems to be completely foreign to a culture that demands convenience above all else."
We've lost count of the independent booksellers that have gone since the beginning of the year, two of which were in our own backyard; the number is heartbreaking.
For more information on how 1 person can make a difference visit www.the350project.net
To find out how much local businesses give back to their communities visit www.indiebound.org
Since it opened in 2005, our store has been one built on a philosophy of inclusion, tolerance, acceptance and subsequent creativity. Our goal was to open the kind of place that would contribute to our community in a way that leaves folks better off for having experienced it.
So when the economy started to nose dive this time last year, we didn't complain. When it continued a downward spiral into the fall and we started to watch the weakening of our neighborhood's small businesses, we threw our shoulders back, determined to dig our heels in.
When the New Year came and went and people started to ask how we were doing, we smiled, nodded and explained that we're way too stubborn to let all of this get the best of us.
But from the front door of The Wild, we can now see 10 vacant storefronts. That should be relatively easy for everyone to see. It should be cause for thought about where we as a community are placing our dollars. We considered e-mailing our Wild family earlier than now, reminding folks to think of their purchases as though they were votes--votes to keep their favorite places in tact. We didn't because we didn't want to seem self-righteous or preachy.
But then came word that this week alone, at least 4 more independent bookstores are closing:
Shaman Drum Bookshop, Ann Arbor, MI; 30 years old
Conkey’s Bookstore, Appleton, WI; 113 years old
Babylon Falling, San Francisco, CA; 2 years old
Hidden Room Book Shoppe, South Haven, MI
We can place blame on the big box stores, internet competition, shrinking school budgets, weak business plans and more, but the bottom line is this: fewer and fewer people are stepping up to the counter in independent stores and spending their money. People like the idea of having independent shops in their town. And in their defense, maybe they think someone else will spend enough to keep things going. Maybe they think that most business owners must be wealthy or they wouldn't be business owners in the first place. Maybe they think that because we're always positive and energetic, things must be okay.
Whatever the justification, the truth is simple and it is this: we are the only ones who can save the independents. If we commit ourselves to being deliberate with our business, this time next year we might still be able to order our favorite dish in our favorite restaurant, pick up our favorite microbrew at our favorite neighborhood pub, grab a unique piece of jewelry at our favorite boutique, enjoy a coffee at our corner coffee shop and, yes, drop by our favorite bookstore for story time or recommendations for great reads. If we continue to chase the deepest discounts and the biggest parking lots, we will be left with big boxes, mediocre products and no service.
Sean Stewart, owner of the closing Babylon Falling, said this in his blog:
"My worry for the future of bookselling is not what people are buying or even the amount they are buying, but rather how they are buying," wrote Stewart. "The idea of the bookseller in a curatorial role as a member of the community seems to be completely foreign to a culture that demands convenience above all else."
We've lost count of the independent booksellers that have gone since the beginning of the year, two of which were in our own backyard; the number is heartbreaking.
For more information on how 1 person can make a difference visit www.the350project.net
To find out how much local businesses give back to their communities visit www.indiebound.org
Thursday, June 11, 2009
Solemn Times in The Wild
On April 23, 2009, we posted the following message: 
"It is with heavy hearts that we send along to you the sad news of the passing of Louise Wild, our friend and half of our famous Wild hissing cockroach duo. When we arrived in the Wild this morning, we found Louise had passed peacefully, on her back, in her sleep, during the night. Her partner and habitat mate of eight months, Thelma, survives. Louise is lying in state through Friday in The Wild. In lieu of flowers, please share a book with a child today. Louise would have wanted it that way."
Since that solemn day, we have experienced numerous ups and downs in The Wild. It seems many of our animals have struggled with the mourning process, each dealing with it in his or her own unique way. Toad, half of our fire-bellied toad couple Toad & Toad, stopped eating. He grew weak and simply sat, thinking, for days. He let himself go, refusing to bathe, even. We carefully rinsed him with warm water and talked through the grief until he began to regain his strenth. He is not 100%, but we are hopeful that he has turned a corner.
Bunnicula Dewey Booklet, the four-year-old rabbit who has called The Wild home for three years now, began a spontaneous molt. He has lost enough hair to knit a sweater. Fortunately, he appears to be nearly through the process and with the addition of extra fiber and papaya to his diet, hairballs haven't been cause for alarm.
Unfortunately, the outcome for Elvis, our giant suckerfish, was not was not so positive. Elvis came to us in April 2006, in a tank of reject fish someone had decided they no longer wanted. One by one, the motley school passed on to the big tank-in-the-sky. But not Elvis; he hung in there. We added a school of nine little mollies for him to play with. Over time, they were each called Home too. Elvis didn't let it get to him. He kept a stiff upper sucker and continued his dedicated fight against algae overgrowth. Louise's passing, however, was more than he could bear. On May 29th, he went belly-up, alone in his tank.
Feeling like you, our loyal Wild family, might think we were using the deaths of our beloved pets as cheap publicity opportunities, we decided to let Elvis's passing go unannounced. Until now. You see, yesterday we cleaned out his tank, too sad to fill it with with new fish. Instead, we dried the tank and lined it with fresh bedding. We made a little teepee of sticks and hot glue, intending to move Louise's partner Thelma into the Park Avenue of hissing cockroach habitats.
Thelma had been silent since Louise's passing. When we tried to move her, she dug her little legs in and held tight to her old bark as if to say, "just go, please, just go." We explained that a fresh start in a new place would be good for her. She hissed. It was her first hiss in weeks. We told her good-night as we closed the store for the evening.
The next morning, we checked on her first thing. She was gone. Not dead, just gone. We spent the majority of the morning looking for her. We brought in more people to search. We fanned out and tried to think like Thelma. Where would a grieving, angry, depressed hissing cockroach go to get away?
It is time to close the shop for the night and we still haven't found her.
It's possible that when we arrive home tonight, we will find her atop the flowerbed grave of Louise, just like the ending to her favorite book: Where the Red Fern Grows. It would be no surprise to us if she spent the entire day making the two-block trek to rest in peace next to her soulmate.
But if you see her, please call us. Even if she doesn't want to come home, we just want to know that she is okay. She left wearing nothing but her shell. She is a beautiful deep, golden-brown; approximately 2 inches in length and about half an inch tall when she's on the move.
As for Pages, it's all good.
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