This is insane overhead if you want to try and run a "leftist" business. It sounds like Scarlett is a trust fund baby with more money than sense.
I've been running a retail business with similar inventory costs for a couple years. I have one employee and I pay them generously. I personally chip in about 20-30k annually to keep the whole thing afloat. It's definitely possible if you keep things small.
Edit to add: 10k in inventory just doesn't add up. In retail you need to turn over inventory multiple times annually to cover your fixed expenses like staff, rent, etc. if you only have 10k worth of inventory and you're burning >10k a month that means you're selling everything in the store every couple weeks. I don't think books move that quickly, although I could be corrected. Usually the retail standard is turning over inventory 4-5 times annually.
Seems like you are assuming they sold the books to cover their monthly burn. But seems it was kept afloat due to donations more than due to inventory sales
My point was that this was indeed a vanity project by someone with more money than sense. At no point does it seem like they had any business plan or conception of how to make money from actually operating the business. It's just cosplaying.
It is rather objectionable to label people with your assumptions. Unless you have some inside information you are just making shit up based on your own judgemental bigotry.
People start "hobby" businesses for many reasons, and those reasons are not always status oriented. All too often I've seen idealistic people with the best intentions crash into reality (often financial reality, but often other causes as in the article).
If you have 120k a year to burn on a "hobby business" I think it's pretty safe to say you're in the top 1%. Calling it a "donation" doesn't change that.
I've been running a retail business with similar inventory costs for a couple years. I have one employee and I pay them generously. I personally chip in about 20-30k annually to keep the whole thing afloat. It's definitely possible if you keep things small.
Edit to add: 10k in inventory just doesn't add up. In retail you need to turn over inventory multiple times annually to cover your fixed expenses like staff, rent, etc. if you only have 10k worth of inventory and you're burning >10k a month that means you're selling everything in the store every couple weeks. I don't think books move that quickly, although I could be corrected. Usually the retail standard is turning over inventory 4-5 times annually.