small audience vs. no audience at all... which would you choose?

So after reading Anne Elizabeth Moore's shpeal on zines, I have to admit that by the end of the article, I was convinced to get into the zine world, and publish my own little periodical on... who knows what. Her last lines got me-- "You can think of it as lost, gone, and unavailable to history — or you can assume it is there, still, somewhere." I didn't want my history to go unheard!
So, whether or not my newfound excitement over zines will carry me through the entire process of actually writing one and finding a way to get it "out there" is yet to be seen.
But you know, the important thing is that this article (plus our trip to Quimby's) helped to define this world more for me. I love that it's completely driven from the passion of the writers. Did the punks who passed out zines at shows care if they got paid? Certainly not. They just wanted to spread their voice, their opinion, their story, etc. I love that about small press publishing.
The only problem I keep encountering is that... no matter how much I can preach about selling out, I still want to see my novel sitting on a shelf at Borders. And I'm not sure that that could really happen with the small press route. Maybe I'm wrong. I hope I'm wrong.
I guess my problem lies in defining what's more important: reaching a broader audience (through a major publishing house) or being immersed in the passionate self-determined world of small press publishing.... but perhaps not reaching as large of an audience (especially if there are only 250 books printed!)
But then again, I don't really have to make this decision.... what it really comes down to is who ever is actually willing to publish my work. And in the end, I'd be happy with 250 people reading my story than no one reading it.