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Covid-19 pandemic hasn't spoiled the plot for independent bookshops

Some shops are well equipped to weather the crisis while others have had to get creative.

REPORTS OF THE death of independent bookshops have been greatly exaggerated but the pandemic is showing just how hardy some of Ireland’s smaller operators can be.

Business restrictions might have put a stop to their in-shop retail operations, but a huge demand for reading materials from stuck-at-home bookworms and stressed parents has given shops a lifeline.

Some are better equipped than others to weather the crisis.

“I suppose we were lucky enough,” says Sarah Kenny, marketing manager of Kenny’s Bookshop on the Tuam Road in Galway City.

Having launched its first website in 1994, a year before a small company called Amazon arrived on the scene, Kenny’s claims to be just the second bookshop in the world to go online.

Consequently, its customer base has always had an international element to it but during the pandemic, domestic orders have become the shop’s bread and butter.

Kenny, whose grandparents set up the shop in 1940, says, “We’ve been online for years so it would have been a huge part of our business anyway.

“I know a lot of bookshops have been, let’s say, setting up a website or putting a lot more of their stock online at the moment so that they can facilitate online orders. But we were already in the position where we had an established presence.”

A bit mad

On the opposite coast and end of the spectrum in terms of online presence is Books Upstairs on D’Olier Street in Dublin 2.

Manager Louisa Earls, whose father, Maurice, originally set up the shop on Dame Street in 1978 and still owns it, says that their situation is “a bit mad”.

“We didn’t have a website. It’s currently in development, which is something that, coincidentally, we had only just started at the time of the lockdown.”

Instead, Earls and her co-workers have managed to tack an online element onto their business in quick fashion, using a simple, make-shift landing page, hosted on marketing platform Mailchimp, to advertise and sell its wares.

Earls says that not having “pre-existing infrastructure” has even been something of a blessing in disguise.

“Not having a whole inventory on a website meant that we kind of had to think creatively. So very early on, we put out this book bundles idea… in a way to recreate the feeling of when you go into a bookshop, and maybe you don’t know what you’re looking for in a new book you didn’t even know existed and you end up buying it.”

Customers can also request specific books through the webpage and by email.

Moment in the sun

Both Earls and Kenny have been blown away by the demand for online orders, which has kept the cash flowing into their respective businesses during the shutdown.

But before the pandemic, independent bookshops were having a moment in the sun.

After two consecutive decades of decline — as Amazon asserted its dominance and with e-books and browsing online beginning to replace real thing — the numbers of independent Irish and UK booksellers had been growing each year for the past three.

As reported by The Guardian, membership of the Booksellers Association had jumped from 868 in 2017 to 890 last year.

Although the increase is decidedly modest, it has to been seen in the context of broader retail patterns.

Early last year, Irish business lobbying group Ibec said there is “consensus in the sector that footfall levels in traditional shopping hot spots are continuing to decline… largely as a result of a move to online shopping”.

In January, before most of us had even heard of Covid-19, Dublin Town, an organisation representing city centre businesses, had noted a decline in footfall in Dublin City Centre of about 15% from the same time last year.

With everything seemingly going against them, how have small, independent bookshops been able to hold on?

Kenny and Earls believe it’s because book-buyers have actually become more thoughtful about their shopping habits, a trend they believe has been copper-fastened by the Covid-19 crisis.

“I don’t know exactly from when to date it, but there has actually been an incredible surge in conscientious shopping,” says Earls.

These days, there are actually a lot more people being conscientious about where they spend their money, wanting to support small and independent businesses and realising that if you don’t shop somewhere, then maybe it won’t be there.

“I would say that sort of thinking has been around for the last few years, but it was not maybe 10 years ago or beyond.”

Kenny thinks there’s just something in the Irish “psyche”.

“We are just are eager to support local and independent and to move away from Amazon where possible. It’s kind of naturally happened. So it’s been very positive”.

Reading habits

As for lockdown reading habits, Kenny and Earls are noticing te the same trends — lots of fiction and lots of children’s books, with a smattering of poetry, self-help and gardening books.

“There definitely has been a few changes from the norm,” Kenny explains.

We’re getting orders for regular children’s books and then also educational children’s books. There’s been a bit more of those. So, you know, teaching your kid at home or learning language, that kind of thing.

“Generally, I would say probably more fiction than anything else,” says Earls, although we have been also shifting a fair bit of poetry and essays.”

“Only the reading brave people are still interested in reading about politics at the moment.”

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    Mute Mairead Jenkins
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    May 23rd 2020, 8:38 PM

    Independent bookshops matter. We need to support them. Hats off to An Post for introducing a special low rate postage fee for books during the pandemic.

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    Mute Tom Fitzgibbons
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    May 23rd 2020, 9:47 PM

    @Mairead Jenkins: Do you ever wonder why they kept off licences open whole closing bookshops? Crazy wasn’t it?

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    Mute Mairead Jenkins
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    May 23rd 2020, 9:54 PM

    @Tom Fitzgibbons: Yes! Agree totally.

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    Mute Jim Buckley Barrett
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    May 23rd 2020, 10:12 PM

    @Tom Fitzgibbons: imagine if we could download some electronic version of the books while enjoying a beer or two…..

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    Mute Callanan
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    May 24th 2020, 1:45 AM

    Please don’t support Amazon. If you have to pay a couple of euro extra so what? It’s the price of a coffee. Support your local booksellers.

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    Mute Trevor Donoghue
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    May 24th 2020, 3:12 AM

    @Callanan: I agree, but you can buy maybe a dozen books or more on amazon for the price as a single new one. unfair for the authors. I used to spend payday in local book stores and come out with with more bags of books than i can carry, nearly all second hand due to the prices. and i miss the smell. but digital is far better for supporting the authors which is a shame.

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    Mute Trevor Donoghue
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    May 23rd 2020, 9:27 PM

    The issue is that there is almost no company that offers anything to the author of second hand book sales. I read a lot, I mean A huge amount, have done so all my life and will generally get through 3 or 4 full length novels a week at least. The authors get nothing with second hand sales even though i prefer print to digital, i buy most of my books on kindle lately as the author get their cut each time. I have a few thousand paper and hardbacks that a lot of the authors did not get a penny from as they were second hand, many were also new but not nearly as much.but i have app app 5000 books on kindle that all the authors get a cut from the sales. It’s an unfair system that needs updating

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    Mute Gordon Comstock
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    May 23rd 2020, 9:57 PM

    @Trevor Donoghue: always wondered why authors never complain about public libraries. Literature seems to have been deemed an art that should be free to all.

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    Mute dublindamo
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    May 23rd 2020, 10:17 PM

    @Gordon Comstock: authors get a small payment when their books are in libraries

    25
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    Mute Gordon Comstock
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    May 23rd 2020, 8:29 PM

    The lack of public transport and commutes could spoil the plot for them. Really miss books since work from home came in.

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    Mute Paul O'Sullivan
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    May 23rd 2020, 8:38 PM

    @Gordon Comstock: Books Upstairs are providing an excellent service….. follow them on instagram and see the professional service they provide.

    23
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    Mute Gordon Comstock
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    May 23rd 2020, 8:42 PM

    @Paul O’Sullivan: it’s not lack of books that’s the problem, I have a stack. It’s lack of time or opportunity to just sit and read without the commute. One of the things I’m really looking forward to about when things start to go back to normal is reading again.

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    Mute dublindamo
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    May 23rd 2020, 10:14 PM

    @Gordon Comstock: first world problems

    7
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    Mute Dan Moran
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    May 24th 2020, 7:54 AM

    @dublindamo: He’s lives in the first world, he’s allowed to have them.

    6
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    Mute L̴a̴yta R̵̝̹̣̦̞̺͈͖͂̋̊̐͌͘̕͠͠ǒ̴͍̱̝̰͔̋͆̓͛͗n̶̊͌
    Favourite L̴a̴yta R̵̝̹̣̦̞̺͈͖͂̋̊̐͌͘̕͠͠ǒ̴͍̱̝̰͔̋͆̓͛͗n̶̊͌
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    May 23rd 2020, 8:37 PM

    Drop shipper’s. Let’s be honest.

    5
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    Mute Dan Moran
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    May 24th 2020, 7:58 AM

    @L̴a̴yta R̵̝̹̣̦̞̺͈͖͂̋̊̐͌͘̕͠͠ǒ̴͍̱̝̰͔̋͆̓͛͗n̶̊͌: they are selling their own stock , not drop shipping . Book Upstairs made a video of their process. You’re a shit talker, let’s be honest.

    5
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    Mute L̴a̴yta R̵̝̹̣̦̞̺͈͖͂̋̊̐͌͘̕͠͠ǒ̴͍̱̝̰͔̋͆̓͛͗n̶̊͌
    Favourite L̴a̴yta R̵̝̹̣̦̞̺͈͖͂̋̊̐͌͘̕͠͠ǒ̴͍̱̝̰͔̋͆̓͛͗n̶̊͌
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    May 24th 2020, 10:24 AM

    @Dan Moran: gawd you’re angry.. the little book shop elves do be on Amazon buying books for 30% of RRP whilst the owner of the online store sleep soundly at night? Hahaha jfc you’re an innocent.

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    Mute Dan Moran
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    May 24th 2020, 1:13 PM

    @L̴a̴yta R̵̝̹̣̦̞̺͈͖͂̋̊̐͌͘̕͠͠ǒ̴͍̱̝̰͔̋͆̓͛͗n̶̊͌: Thanks for the reply sugar plumb

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