Anoosh Chakelian investigates how Oxfam is challenging the bookselling giants – and which unwanted authors we are dumping after Christmas.
Not a charity case: Anne Paterson, the manager of Oxfam Books in Turnham Green, West London. Oxfam is now the third-largest bookseller in the UK. Photo: Andrew Crowley
By Anoosh Chakelian - The Telegraph - 09 Jan 2012“God, Waterstone’s – they don’t half charge”, says Anne Paterson, the manager of Oxfam Books in Turnham Green, West London. She suggests this is an increasingly common view among the British book-buying public.
“This store has become very popular. I definitely think people are coming here to look at what we’ve got first, before going to Waterstone’s. Like book groups who are deciding what their book is will come and have a look here first.”
Countering the cosy image of high-street charity shops, Paterson is a savvy businesswoman, managing one of Oxfam’s most successful bookshops with a 50-strong volunteer rota.
Out of the 700 Oxfam shops in Britain, 140 of them are bookshops. Oxfam sells 11 million books a year and are its second highest-selling items after clothing. The charity store has become the biggest second-hand bookseller in Europe, and the third largest general book retailer in Britain.
The economic downturn has meant Oxfam bookshops across the country have seen a recent surge in both sales and donations. In December they achieved the highest book sales of the last 5 years, 13 per cent higher than in December 2010. By contrast, sales of the top 50 brand new books in the month before Christmas were down by 19 per cent (one million copies) compared with the same period in 2010.
Full story at The Telegraph.
Full story at The Telegraph.
