Death of independent bookshops? Hardly.

To celebrate Independent Booksellers Week, Simon Key, from North London's Big Green Bookshop, tells us what his shop means to the local community and why it's important to think 'independent'.

We own a little bookshop in North London called the Big Green Bookshop. We've been open now for over four years and we absolutely love what we do.

But what do we do?

Well, being an independent bookshop, this could mean pretty much anythingWell, being an independent bookshop, this could mean pretty much anything. Today, for example I'm finalising details for a toddler's disco, that we're going to hold in the bookshop next month. We tidied up the shop after last night's excellent Writer's Workshop by our author in residence Ellie Levenson called 'Coming Up With Ideas'. Our Eleven O'clock Book Group also met today to discuss Fludd by Hilary Mantel (it got a big thumbs up). 

We've just got the line-up sorted for our monthly Comedy Night that we hold in the store and my head is hurting after three hours spent going through a very dull, but very necessary spreadsheet.

This is just one day, but it's typical in its uniqueness.

As a shop, we are here to serve our community. It's up to us to listen to what they have to say and to do all we can to provide them with what they want. Actually, I think I prefer being known as a community bookshop, rather than an independent, because I don't think we are independent. We're dependent on our community. Without them, we wouldn't survive. Our community is our Head Office. It indirectly (and sometimes directly) dictates what we do. And nobody wants to let Head Office down, do they?

Last year we were in a bit of trouble. Bills were mounting up and things weren't looking good. We only had 9 months left to pay of the massive bank loan that we took out to open the shop, but the way things were going, we were going to struggle to get that far. So we sent out a 'please help' message to our customers. It explained the situation and also offered a realistic solution. What happened next was incredible. Our customers came out in droves to help us out. We were totally overwhelmed by the support we got and the goodwill we were shown was something that still brings me to tears. We are still here and it's all thanks to our community. They clearly wanted us to stick around and understood we weren't just another corporate retail outlet that had no interest in anything other than making as much money as possible.

There are independent bookshops like ours all over the nationWe are proud to be seen as a part of our community and we are delighted that we are deemed important enough that our customers want us to stick around. There are independent bookshops like ours all over the nation, who aim to support and enrich their own communities in the same way as we aim to. And I really really hope it stays that way. Vive l'independence. Or maybe it should be vive la communauté.

Related links

Independent Booksellers Week

Big Green Bookshop

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