At the heart of publishing since 1858
Issue 5960
Editor's Letter Blackwell’s on the block F
The performance of books, including printed books sold from high street bookshops, has been resilient
ew may remember now but back in those pre-Covid halcyon days of January 2020, the independent bookshop chain Blackwell’s wrote to publishers seeking an additional 7% of discount in order to ramp up its push to become profitable, part of a strategy to ultimately hand the business over to its employees. A lot has happened since then of course, and I do not know if the chain received the extra bung from publishers it was asking for, but two years on the company was this week put up for sale. You may read into that what you will. One thing I did notice is that those who loudly contested Blackwell’s efforts to improve its margin two years ago were curiously quiet aſter this news broke. It is difficult to pick out from Blackwell’s latest financial accounts how big a dent the pandemic has made in the business: in the 18 months to 2nd January 2021 it recorded a loss of £476,000, and that February banked a short-term loan from its owner Toby Blackwell. In its press statement this week, Blackwell’s said that sales rose 1.9% over the next 12 months thanks to brisk online business. As pandemics go, other businesses have fared worse, and Blackwell’s management is right to point to an improving record over the medium term, as well as a significant investment in its website. More worrying, though, is the reveal that an atempt to refinance the business has “proved to be difficult”, resulting in the decision to pop up a “for sale” sign—even if the management can highlight the uncertain economic backdrop, as well
as a fragile high street. Clearly the middle remains the hardest place to be—it was not so long ago that the UK boasted a number of small to medium-sized chains, now either swallowed up by Waterstones or bankrupted. Beyond the obvious, it is not clear who steps in.
Academic bookselling faces tougher conditions than the general trade, but Blackwell’s best bookshops ably cater to both tpes of reader; equally, as Booktopia has shown in Australia and Wordery over here, there remains plent of opportunit in online, when done well. Elliot will take a look too, of course. I don’t have any inside track, but James Daunt has already saved the Foyles brand, and I expect the same feelings would apply to the Blackwell’s name too. And in realit, the performance of books, including printed books sold from actual high street bookshops, has been resilient with the pandemic, cementing what had already become a trend. It is barely three years since Elliot Advisors bought Barnes & Noble for $683m, around $1m per shop, or a fiſth of its then turnover. As boss Daunt has shown, investors can be atracted to the steady income stream book sales can provide, as well as the format’s renewed status as a hardy perennial. Well run, locally focused, profitable bookshops are a thing for the future, not the past.
ennial.Well run, okshops are a ast.
As a former employee of Blackwell’s, I take this one personally. Ten years before Blackwell’s asked for additional discounts, Foyles raised its own red flag. That just about ended well. We should be so lucky again.
ackwell’
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In next week’s magazine New Titles Non-Fiction: May 2022
Philip Jones @philipdsjones Contents4th February 2022 06
I’m a really visual writer... If I can’t ‘see’ it I struggle to write it. It has to be able to play out as if it’s a scene
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04.02.22 ISSN 0006-7539 24 At the heart of the book trade since 1858. £5.95
THE MIDDLE-GRADE MOMENT OF 2022
from Yomi Adegoke & Elizabeth Uviebinené
cover.indd 46
02/02/2022 10:14
28th April
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