'bookshops are best route to market'

22.09.14 | Lisa Campbell - The Bookseller

Bookshops in the UK and Ireland must “invest” to become “the best in the world,” the Bookseller Association president Tim Walker has told delegates at the Bookseller Association Conference in Warwick this morning (22nd September).

Walker made the rallying cry for bookshops to arm-up in the face of digital and online bookselling, telling the delegation that bookshops were still publishers’ and authors’ “very best route to market”.

Booksellers will succeed by engaging better with customers and reminding them that “bookshops are still the very best places to discover books,” Walker said. “In this modern bookselling era of p-books and e-books, the world has not ended for bookshops as many predicted. Yes it is tough, but print book sales through bookshops are still strong and whilst it is easy to become distracted by the allure of digital media, we must maintain publishers’ and authors’ focus on the fact that booksellers and bookshops are still their very best route to market.”

He added: “We should reiterate our belief that booksellers believe in freedom, diversity, partnership and a profitable book industry for all. We all need this profitability. Booksellers must invest to make our bookshops some of the best in the world.”

Walker also called on publishers to print high quality physical books and make sure they put “authors back at the heart of our trade” by paying them higher royalties.

“Publishers must continue to take risks, to discover exciting new authors and to publish books that are printed up to a specification and not down to the lowest price; and, of course, we booksellers want to see authors back at the heart of our trade being fairly and richly rewarded for their work,” Walker said. “We must reassure publishers and authors that as true partners, we booksellers will strive to work with them to bring the best of British and Irish publishing to the widest possible audience.”

Walker also welcomed new bookshops to the Association, praising their “excitement”, “drive” and “enthusiasm” for “breathing new life into our bookshops”, and said the industry should recognise more the great work that bookshops do. “In spite of all of this talent and passion and customer satisfaction, as an industry we are terribly bad at recognising the fantastic work that goes on in all of our bookshops, up and down the country, every single day,” he said.