The Business of Resistance: How Demetrius Frazier Is Building More Than a Bookstore

Demetrius Frazier was not planning to become a bookseller. He had built a successful corporate career, risen into senior leadership, and assumed he would stay on that track until retirement. “I wasn’t looking to take on a new passion or mission,” he says. Then he noticed a problem. While leading Black Men Read, a national book club encouraging Black men to read and buy books by Black authors, Frazier kept hearing the same complaint: members could not find the books.

“They would go look for the book and say they couldn’t find it, or it wasn’t on the shelf,” he says. The issue was bigger than one title or one store. Black literature was often difficult to access, particularly in communities where independent Black bookstores were scarce.

“The problem inspired me.”

That problem eventually became Resist Booksellers in Petersburg, Virginia.

Resisting the Model

When Frazier began researching where to open, traditional business models told him where not to go. Communities with lower incomes, lower literacy rates, and fewer retail advantages routinely failed the metrics. Those were also the communities he believed most needed a bookstore.

“We just resisted the model,” Frazier says. “We said, no, we’re going to the place where we need to be, as opposed to where we think we can have the easiest path to profitability.”

That decision gave Resist its name.The store first launched online, an experience Frazier describes simply as “absolutely terrible.” He was still working full-time, learning how to run a business, and competing with major retailers and established independent stores. By the end of the first year, it was clear the online model was not sustainable.

That realization led Resist to pivot to a brick-and-mortar store. And that changed everything.

More Than a Bookstore

When someone walks into Resist, Frazier wants them to know immediately that they belong. Children see books displayed with characters who look like them. Adults find stories that reflect their lives. New readers are not made to feel intimidated. “You should see that your story, your life, your experience is highlighted,” he says.

But Resist is not built only around books. Book clubs meet there for free. Community organizations host events. The store has held political town halls and Know Your Rights programming. Sometimes people come in simply because they need somewhere to be. “We’ve had people come in crying because they just needed a moment,” Frazier says. “Sometimes they literally came in just to get some rest.” He calls Resist “a small oasis.”

That sense of belonging helped him earn the trust of Petersburg, a city where deep family ties matter and outsiders are often watched carefully. When Frazier first arrived, residents wanted to understand his intentions. “Are you here just to exploit the area? Are you here just to make a quick buck? Are you family?” His work in literacy and community building helped answer those questions. “They want to know that you are here for them,” he says. “And they will be here for you.”

Mission Has to Survive

Frazier is equally clear that community-centered bookselling cannot run on good intentions alone. “I think people think when you open up a Black independent bookstore that you just sit around and read books all day,” he says. “I think I read more QuickBooks than I read hardcover and paperback novels.” For him, one lesson matters above nearly everything else:

“You have to run a business that supports your mission. Your mission will not support your business.” New booksellers often want to launch every community initiative at once. Frazier understands the instinct because he did it too. “You’re coming in with the vibes. You’re coming in with the large mission and you want to do it all.” But payroll, rent, and expenses eventually force hard choices.

“If you are successful with the business early on, you will be able to do all those things later,” he says. “Maybe just not day one.” It is an important distinction in Frazier’s philosophy: profitability and purpose are not opposing ideas. A Black bookstore has to survive in order to continue serving the people it was created for.

An Ecosystem, Not a Competition

That business discipline has not made Frazier territorial. He wants more Black bookstores. “If you buy a hundred books and you buy 20 from me and 20 from another, we’ve all completed our mission.” For Frazier, Black bookselling is an ecosystem. If Resist disappeared tomorrow and no other stores were serving the community, the larger mission would have failed.

“What if I close? Then we go back to zero.” That philosophy is part of what drew him to the National Association of Black Bookstores, NAB², where he serves as Advisory Board Chair. Before accepting, he asked himself whether the organization had a clear mission, whether it was positioned to succeed, and whether his time could make a real difference.

The answer was yes. “I think NAB² is keenly focused on making sure the health of Black bookstores across the country is strong and that we continue to grow.” It is the same idea that drives his approach at Resist: strengthening one Black bookstore matters, but strengthening the network creates something capable of lasting.

An Old Fight With a New Name

Frazier also sees Black bookstores as essential in a moment of renewed attacks on Black history, literature, and access to information. But he does not believe the struggle itself is new. “This is where our elders are super important,” he says. Earlier generations of Black booksellers faced censorship, accusations of radicalism, and efforts to suppress the ideas circulating through their stores. “They faced challenges before. They just had a different name.”

For Frazier, the lesson is to study how those generations endured. “How did you fight? How did you win? How did you survive?” Today’s challenges, he says, are “just a challenge with a new face and a new name.”

What Comes Next

Frazier’s vision now stretches beyond Resist. One of the opportunities he sees most clearly is on HBCU campuses. He imagines a future where independently owned Black bookstores operate campus bookstores at historically Black colleges and universities across the country. “We should be way stronger and way more tied in.”

For him, the connection is obvious: HBCUs have long cultivated Black thinkers and movement leaders, while Black bookstores have historically served as centers of ideas, culture, and organizing. “You’ve got revolutionary thought on those campuses,” he says, “and a revolutionary commercial enterprise in the Black bookstore.” But Frazier does not envision simply replacing one national retailer with a single Black-owned equivalent.

“I don’t want to replace Barnes & Noble with one Black Barnes & Noble.” He wants locally rooted booksellers serving locally rooted communities. “It just seems like a marriage waiting to happen.”

The Door Opener

Ask Frazier how he wants to be remembered and he does not mention awards or recognition. “I would hope they would say, ‘He encouraged me to open up a bookstore. I did.’” He would rather be “the door opener.” That vision is bigger than Resist itself.

“I would rather have more spaces for our Black readers than less.”

He dreams that one day Petersburg will no longer be a city where one bookstore carries the weight of serving an entire community. “I came here, there were zero bookstores in the last 30 years,” he says. “Once I’m done, man, Petersburg is a book town.”

He imagines dozens of independent bookstores—different owners, different specialties, different communities of readers—all thriving alongside one another. That is the legacy Frazier wants. Not one successful bookstore.

An ecosystem. And a door left open for whoever decides to build next.