All About Allstora, RuPaul's Co-Founded Bookstore
In an effort to support authors — and diverse and unheard voices — RuPaul Charles has co-founded an online book marketplace. The bookstore, Allstora, offers fair compensation to authors for their creative work –- an age-old battle for writers, particularly in the era of ebooks and e-readers. "When you buy a book from Allstora, the author makes double what they'd make from any other retailer. And we're just getting started," Allstora says in its mission statement.
Allstora is a rebranding of ShopQueer.co, a platform created to promote queer literature, and RuPaul jumped into the team as both co-founder and chief creative officer. "Together, we've concluded that this disruptive business model shouldn't be restricted to just one community alone. All authors–––whether they're queer, trans, Black, Brown, neurodiverse, or disabled–deserve fair compensation," Allstora captioned its March 4, 2024, Instagram announcement. A few days prior, RuPaul hinted at the announcement of an exciting new venture on his Instagram page, urging viewers to visit RuPaul2024.com, which now redirects to Allstora's website. The political theme of his February 27 teaser video directly relates to the political nature of spreading diverse voices and fighting back against book bans nationwide.
"We are moving the conversation forward. Allstora is supporting authors, it is supporting you, all voices everywhere. This is a platform that I am in love with," RuPaul stated in an Instagram reel that garnered more than 100,000 likes in its first few hours.
Shop by community or genre at Allstora
Allstora allows readers to search for titles by genre and community to see an expansive range of books by minority authors. What's more, Allstora's community tab is sectioned into several subcategories: Sexual Identity, Gender Identity, Racial Identity, and Other Identity, which includes neurodiverse and disabled sections.
For example, if you click on the neurodiverse tab, you'll be shown over 2,000 books on topics like autism and dyslexia, including psychological books and novels featuring neurodivergent protagonists. The site's genre tab shows us much of what you'd see in standard book marketplaces: divisions based on fiction, nonfiction, and readers' ages. So, you can still easily peruse the top romance books or the latest fantasy series that everyone seems to be reading.
"I started reading books at a very early age, and they were a lifeline to the rest of the world for me," the namesake host of "RuPaul's Drag Race" told People. "I loved the idea of knowledge is power, and knowledge is a way to transport yourself to wherever you wanna be." And transportation is just what the Allstora team is doing. In collaboration with the queer non-profit wayOUT, Allstora founded The Rainbow Book Bus, which works to get banned books — and diverse books in general — into the hands of folks across the South.
The library — er, RuPaul's book club — is now open
Making readership affordable and fun, Allstora stands tall in its mission to support authors and their readers. Allstora memberships are available for $5 monthly, allowing you to receive 50% off your first three book purchases and 30% off all succeeding purchases. Plus, the first month of membership is free. Altogether, this could make purchasing books more affordable than shopping at other bookstores, and when you combine this with authors receiving a bigger cut, you get a rather wholesome book-buying and reading experience.
RuPaul famously uses the phrases "reading is fundamental" and "the library is now open" on each season of "Drag Race," so it should come as no surprise that he's also now running a book club. Becoming a book club member grants you exclusive access to podcasts by RuPaul and authors he loves, one RuPaul-selected book delivered to you each month, a limited-edition print hand-signed by the Supermodel of the World himself, and more. The inaugural book club pick was none other than RuPaul's new memoir, "The House of Hidden Meanings." The book club and Allstora membership bundle is $17.50 per month, while the book club membership alone is $35.
Many fans and followers are overjoyed by the news of an inclusivee spac promoting minority voices. "As a queer and trans poet I love this. Thank you!!" one Instagram user commented on Allstora's announcement post. "My favorite book shop gets even better (while still being very queer)," another commented. Perusing Allstora occasionally could be a good habit to help you start reading more, but before you do, be sure to brush up on the market's controversy.
Allstora has faced backlash for its book selection
Shortly after the launch of the marketplace geared toward elevating queer and minority voices, Allstora fell under fire from less-than-impressed site perusers who immediately took to social media to express their disappointment with the bookstore –- and ultimately call it a "rainbow capitalized drop shipping operation" in the case of @bookendsinflorence on TikTok. While Allstora shares its disdain for mega-markets like Amazon on its website, it offers over 10 million book titles that are likely shipped from a massive book supplier, making Allstora a middleman between supplier and consumer. While other bookstores use suppliers like this, they also typically hand-pick their book selections rather than selling every book the supplier offers, which creates a different atmosphere around the bookseller.
This is significant because Allstora doesn't seem to filter through the available book options and select the titles it sells, which fans were disheartened to find. Case in point: Its large offering means you can purchase problematic books that seem to go directly against Allstora's mission, including anti-woke, transphobic, and homophobic titles — and even Adolf Hitler's "Mein Kampf." Even if a massive catalog is desirable for the Allstora team, sifting through the options to remove harmful titles would help create the safe space queer and minority readers need.
Ultimately, it looks like RuPaul's latest endeavor might not be as wholesome as some originally thought. "RuPaul co founding a drop shipping 'queer book store' scam website was not on my 2024 bingo card, but honestly it doesn't surprise me," one user wrote on X, formerly known as Twitter. Whether any updates to Allstora's catalog or operational processes have been made remains to be seen.