This highly energetic and exciting excursion is best done with a travel buddy or a group of friends! If you’re driving, we recommend carpooling for parking and earth-friendliness. Stay hydrated; bring a water bottle! Plan your snack stops ahead of time.

No, starting in year two we decided to make the stakes less stressful (and more accessible for those taking transit and/or a slower pace). You do not need to visit every single bookstore listed in the passport to qualify to win a prize. Each bookstore will have a unique QR code to scan in order to get points associated with that visit. In other words, the more bookstores you visit, the higher chance you have of winning a prize!

Nope! The QR code will be the same for different locations of the same bookstore, so you only need to visit one location to enter.

You do NOT need to make a purchase, but we do encourage it. The whole point of Independent Bookstore Day is to show up and support independent bookstores however you’re able and wherever you are! Even if your purchase is small, such as a sticker, card, or bookmark, that’s still something tangible.

The “indie” in Edmonton Indie Bookstore Extravaganza is a short form for Independent. This means the bookstore is locally owned and generally only has one location (although there are exceptions!). Independent is meant to distinguish these local underdog bookstores from corporate chain stores like Indigo or corporate bookselling platforms like Amazon, both of which rake in big bucks for billionaires rather than contributing to local economies and neighbourhoods. While indies may differ on their values and practices, every dollar you spend at an indie stays local and supports an entire ecosystem of books, booksellers, workers, publishers, writers, and distributors.