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The widening gap between price-slashing and service Print E-mail
Bookselling
Written by Patrick Neale   
Tuesday, 19 January 2010 09:37

The collapse of Borders and Waterstone's difficulties reveal opportunities for independents, but high street bookselling remains precarious, writes Patrick Neale

While I have been clearing snow from the pavements of Chipping Norton people have been asking me, "How was your Christmas?" Well, in the trade, I can answer that it has been better than Philip Downer’s and Gerry Johnson’s. The end of 2009 has certainly highlighted that being a chain bookseller isn’t the fun it was in the late '80s and early '90s. Both men did the very best they could with the cards they were dealt. I am not that surprised by Waterstone’s figures, although they should have swept up Borders' customers in the last weeks before the festive turkeys were devoured, and there is no indication that they did. That was a missed opportunity. I imagine the master plan from the centre was in place by then, and so there was no time or appetite for initiative or entrepreneurship.

It may be good old-fashioned naivety, but I obsess about my customers rather than about something called "the hub". The hub sounds so Orwellian. I am sure it illustrates how big companies put their shareholders first while chanting shallow homilies about customers and staff being so important. You can put customers first only when you give local autonomy; and, so far, no big company truly trusts their managers with significant financial control. Compliance becomes the KPI (Key Performance Indicator), while initiative and bookishness are to be distrusted or at best frowned upon.

I failed to prove, while working for Waterstone’s, that there was no conflict between loving books and a P and L at the same time. The two can be bedfellows without any infidelity or dishonesty. As an independent bookseller I am determined to prove this marriage possible.

Amazon, the supermarkets and unease about the electronic future have certainly rocked the middle of the market.
 
Some may take pleasure from seeing the big companies suffer. But really it just highlights how turbulent things are. I certainly feel more affinity with Borders and Waterstone’s staff than I do with the product and unit pushers at Amazon and Tesco Towers.

So maybe there are opportunities for well-placed independents to widen their net a little as the lines are clearly defined between service and style or price-slashing. But I can’t see the independent sector growing dramatically in the next five years. Alan Giles, my brilliant old boss, reckons there’s room for new players to step in where Borders and Waterstone’s have backed away. I agree, but I think there will have to be a radical shift in how a new "chain" organises itself. There will need to be real profit incentives for staff, or perhaps a form of franchise needs to be developed so that customers get that sense of ownership and pride that they appear to enjoy in independent shops. Any retailer knows you are only as good as your worst member of staff. So the bigger the company the greater the chance of unmemorable or unmentionable service.

We finished 2009 up on previous year, achieving a small growth in book sales and selling a whole lot more coffee, cakes and gifts.

It’s great that our book sales are up. But my figures are modest, and I won’t be popping any champagne bottles in celebration of 2009. I am beginning to wonder if 2007 really was the golden age of bookselling and we didn’t even realise it. Another reason I won’t be celebrating is that many more customers told me, as they were purchasing a book, the amount the book would have cost them on Amazon. Whether they were telling me to show their loyalty or to threaten I don’t know. But it really brought home to me how precarious high street retailing is. Our costs are high and our customers fickle. So it is my task to wow them every time they visit. It’s going to be tough. Independent booksellers need to stay true to what they do best and most importantly not get too greedy.

One thing I know for sure. I didn’t see any Amazon staff on the streets of Chipping Norton with snow shovels.

Patrick Neale is Proprietor of the Jaffe & Neale Bookshop & Cafe in Chipping Norton, Oxfordshire. Jaffe & Neale was Independent Bookseller of the Year at the 2007 Bookseller Retail Awards

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SUSAN HILL
...
written by SUSAN HILL, January 19, 2010
Up to, say, 12.99 or even £15 price tag one can ignore the discounting and purchase a book at full price from an independent but if a book costs more - £20/£25 say - then it makes a huge difference if amazon has it for £12 and £14 post free.. the difference of being able to then buy two books for the same price.
Amaxon upfront big discounts do not translate so impressively to back list though - I looked at a 7.99 paperback there yesterday and it was only discounted by 1.10... some obscure titles on backlist are barely discounted at all. So it makes sense for all the Indies to trawl through amazon and see what is on a really 'silly offer' and not bother to stock that - many follow this policy anyway.
I disagree with Patrick that amazon and Tesco go together though... amazon has fantastic customer service/delivery, it is speedy and efficient and it recommends other books 'you may like.' I know they sell other things but those are kept quite separate. Tesco asks you to bung a book in your trolley, bagless, on top of the leeks and there is no one to give you any help or information whatsoever. They also have no backlist supply of any kind.
There is room for a lot more really good Indies.. I know that Winchester and Salisbury, to name but two places where people buy a lot of books, are crying out for them. Come on somebody.

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