Heather Collins: Bookshops belong on the high street, not the internet

Umm hi, my name’s Heather and I don’t buy any of my books online.

Now that shouldn’t be a dirty secret; I don’t think there’s anything wrong with being a loyal supporter of bookshops but somehow it quite often feels like it. Tell someone you don’t use Amazon and they look at you like you’re stupid or technologically inept.

This happened recently when I was drawn into a lively discussion in the office about the virtues of bookshop book-buying. It’s a topic I generally prefer not to talk about as it’s not an easy stance to defend in the face of a person who has a healthy bookshelf bursting with cheap books and a doormat piled high with Amazon parcels.

Still, I’m going to give it a go. I’ll begin with tackling the points usually made by the Amazon shopper.

Why should I pay full price for a book when I can get it so cheaply online?

I am happy to spend more on a book for the same reasons I’ll always pay more for Organic eggs, Organic chicken and fair-trade coffee – I believe it’s worth it. I never want to see the day where there are no bookshops on the high street and if paying £6.99 for a novel would help to avoid that then I think it’s worth every penny.

In a bookshop I get the service of knowledgeable staff, a large array of books on display to inspire me and the pleasure of taking my time browsing the shelves. 

Obviously there are lots of people in our society who can’t afford to buy books at the full price and so naturally an online discount retailer such as Amazon makes perfect sense for them. That’s absolutely fine. In the meantime, if everyone else sacrificed their walk-to-work skinny latte just three times a week that would cover the cost of a new paperback from their local bookshop. People who say they can’t afford it usually can, they just don’t believe it’s worth it. My problem is how to convince them it is.

Bookshops don’t stock a big enough range and booksellers are not actually that knowledgeable so there’s no reason for me to use them.

There will always be limits on what a bookshop can stock, particularly in the face of competition with Amazon. If more people used their bookshops I believe this would change. If more of us supported our bookshops we’d see a return to the local bookshop where stock was shelved to cater for the interests of local customers. Many bookshops will also happily order in anything you want that they don’t have in stock so you can still support them that way. 

As for dismissing every bookseller in the land as useless just because of a few negative experiences, we all know that’s a silly thing to do. I know lots of fantastic booksellers who know the stock on their shelves intimately and can help a customer with even the most obscure enquiry. In larger stores it becomes difficult for staff to know every single book inside out but a quick look on the computer and they have your answer in seconds. Don’t confuse computers in bookshops as meaning brain-dead booksellers. This is just wrong. It’s about efficient customer service, something that booksellers do better than any other retail assistant.

It’s easier and quicker to buy the book online. I don’t have the time to go to a shop.

Oh dear. Well I guess anyone who doesn’t have the time to go to a bookshop has never really enjoyed spending time browsing in one and that’s a great shame. If you had you’d make the time. I can think of few better ways to spend an hour or two. Some people have to make a long journey to get to a bookshop these days so I understand why the internet works for them, however most of the Amazon shoppers I know live in town and city centres, walking distance from a bookshop.

As for it being quicker and easier, yes I can’t really argue with that one, a few clicks of a mouse and you’re done. But I’ll say two things; firstly I rarely go to a bookshop knowing exactly what I want to read next so I need the chance to browse. It’s much easier to browse physical bookshelves than a website. Secondly when I was a bookseller I would serve many customers who either didn’t have access to the internet so needed their bookshop, or did have the internet but were uncomfortable shopping online. I worry that we assume too much from people when it comes to the internet and feel it’s very important to respect the large number of people who just aren’t quite as knowledgeable about the web as the rest of us or are unable to pick up those skills for a variety of reasons. Can we not protect bookshops for them?

There are many more arguments but this is getting rambling, so look, it comes down to this: I don’t want high streets without bookshops. I worry all the time that this is exactly where we’re heading. I wish that more of my fellow book-lovers shared my love of bookshops and wanted to help create an environment where bookshops can flourish. For this reason I don’t buy my books online and I won’t, until the actions of all the Amazon users force my hand. I realise I’ve probably not convinced you, but if you could pop out at the weekend to a bookshop and buy a book you’d make this former-closet bookshop user a very happy woman. Most of the people reading this blog have the power to help change bookshops for the better. Wouldn’t brilliant bookshops in our towns and cities be the best gift for one generation of book-lovers to pass on to the next? I think so.