Australian independent publishers and distributors RAINOFF are hosting a temporary store in Sydney over the next 2 weeks. I caught up with Co-founder Rob Milne on how RAINOFF began: ‘RAINOFF started in October 08 with a small publication by Sam Ash. A major reason for us starting out publishing was that we’re really into books and magazines. So we wanted to create our own. Naturaly we wanted to publish work that we thought deserved recognition. Distribution came as a second thought to the publishing… we thought since we will be distributing our own books we may as well try to distribute other publishers that were previously not available here. Opening the store was a very exciting venture, even if it is only for two weeks. Hopefully it will provide insight into independent publishing for a wider audience. Many of the titles and publishers that are in the store are previously very hard to come by in Australia. It was important for us to bring them all together in one place. When asked about the future of print publishing versus online,  Milne believes the future of print is secure, questioning the disposability of internet content:

The gallery/store features collected works by international titles such as Daddy  and Fantastic Man as well as some sound local titles. ‘There are lot and lots of great independent publishers producing things all the time’ says Rob. ‘Be sure to check out Serps Press from Melbourne and The Spring Press from Sydney. Both do amazing work.’