The History of BookTabby
A first draft of a logo from 2022
BookTabby started off as an idea back in 2022. I had just graduated college and was looking for what I wanted to do next. I was reading regularly and was working on 52 books in 52 weeks challenge. I wanted to feel more connected to the reading community. In 2022 I thought of the name, secured the handle on social media, and made a BookTabby email, but I didn’t take any further action on it. The name is a play on our tabby cat and my love of books, combined. At the end of 2023, I had started my first post-grad job and was looking for things to fill my weekend. I read 82 books in 2022 and was close to hitting my goal of 100 in 2023. It was fall and beautiful outside, so I decided to go out with a camera and take some pictures of my books. I made the BookTabby Instagram account and started posting regularly. It was a great way to get my foot in the door and start to experience more community. I found that bookstagram, Instagram with a book focus, was a great place to meet kind people, find book recommendations, and share books I love. I also loved the photography aspect of it.
As my book Instagram continued to grow, I found myself wanting to do a longer form of content. Where maybe a natural deviation would be to start making YouTube videos, I wanted to stay anonymous and wasn’t ready to put my face out there. Over the summer of 2024 I found myself with an excess of free time and so I started messing around with making a blog. I had made many WordPress sites and felt like with the use of Squarespace I could make a cool website, write blogs with my thoughts, and create a place I could be creative. In my state, having a blog counted as a business and thus I had to register all kinds of paperwork to have a business name, tax stuff, etc. It turned into a part-time job for a while, just trying to get everything together and set up.
The official BookTabby Logo
It was all worth it in the end as the BookTabby blog went live in September of 2024, and It has been one of the most rewarding experiences of my life. I never would have thought I would be a small business owner, or that I would even be capable of navigating so much paperwork, but I did it and I now have my own corner of the internet. As for the blog itself, Squarespace made it easy to set up and I have changed, redesigned, and refined my website a lot over the last 6 months. I love my small brand, and I love sharing bookish thoughts and reviews with my friends and family. I started BookTabby as a “for fun” Instagram and over a year and a half it grew to include a blog, a Pango store, and a more “for serious” Instagram account. I want to continue to improve my blog and other social media as I feel like I have really grown from the experience and learned a lot about what I am capable of.