Directory of typeface sellers

Eris Alar · June 2021

The recent news about ILT's shop prompted me to think about the places I look for type on, and I realised I tend to stick to a few trusted sources and don't check many different places usually. Has anyone put together a directory or listing of all the major places to license type? I guess this would tie into a directory of foundries too, and maybe each foundry entry lists where they sell their type.

Stephen Coles · June 2021

A directory of foundries is increasingly difficult to maintain. There are just so many now. When Typographica did our 2013 census we counted 314 active foundries in Europe, Americas, Australia, and New Zealand. I bet that number has at least tripled in 2021.

type.lol is more current, but certainly not complete at 323 foundries.

Matthew Smith’s much more selective foundry directory is interesting because it includes data about trial fonts, educational discounts, and availability on Fontstand or Adobe Fonts.

Off the top of my head, the major current retailers (i.e., resellers, distributors) are:

Adobe Fonts
Creative Market
I Love Typography
Font Bros
Fontspring
Fontstand
Future Fonts
Monotype (Fonts.com, FontShop, Linotype.com, MyFonts)
Type.Today
Type Network

I don’t know of a source that lists all the retailers where where each foundry sells their type, but we do provide as much of that information as possible on a typeface-specific basis on Fonts In Use.

Eris Alar · June 2021

Thanks @Stephen Coles. Yeah I imagine and such directory would be very difficult to create. Maybe to start smaller, it could originate with foundries on here, so a Type Drawers Directory? @James Hultquist-Todd how do I fork this thread so that the TD feature request appears in there? Or should I just start a new thread?

Mark Simonson · June 2021

A few more distributors:

Dusan Jelesijevic · June 2021

In my experience, true distributors are those who offer real time sale reports.

Johannes Neumeier · July 2021

This list is also quite comprehensive: https://type.lol/

Stephen Coles · July 2021

I listed type.lol above. Keep in mind, it is a list of foundries (companies or labels that produce fonts), not sellers.

Oliver Weiss (Walden Font Co.) · July 2021

I was crushed to find that I was on none of those lists

Had to write a bunch of emails toot sweet!

Delve Withrington · November 2023

Is Village still in operation? The website is down at the time of writing this. Hopefully it is just a technical issue. 🥺

Justin Penner · November 2023

Village is no longer in operation.

In September 2023, we closed the doors of vllg.com after 18 years. We are very proud of the work we did to bring the work of a supremely talented group of young designers to the wider world in the early days of e-commerce. We are humbled by the faith those designers put in us and thank them for inspiring us and allowing us to amplify their creativity.
- https://www.laborandwait.xyz/newsletter

If you follow the link, the announcement also includes links to where you can find the former fonts and foundries of vllg.com.

Delve Withrington · November 2023

Thanks for sharing that link @Justin Penner. Sad to hear about Village closing.

Directory of typeface sellers

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