EDINBURGH'S NEWEST BOOKSHOP
GOES BACK TO
OLD-FASHIONED
VALUES
The Edinburgh Bookshop,
a brand new general bookshop for the capital, will open on 5th September in the vibrant south side of the city. Its owners, Vanessa and
Malcolm Robertson, hope to continue the legacy of the original Edinburgh
Bookshop, which operated in George
Street for many years, by bringing back the core
values of customer service, wide-ranging stock selection and well-informed
staff. It will provide a welcoming environment for customers to browse, with
expert advice on hand.
The Edinburgh Bookshop will carry almost 3,000 titles,
with a wide range of fiction and non-fiction, from the classics to the quirky
and from beautifully illustrated non-fiction titles to the latest graphic
novel. And if a particular book is not stocked, it can be ordered within 48
hours.
The Edinburgh Bookshop will be run by Andrew
Bentley-Steed, who has a distinguished career in bookselling, firstly with
English bookshop chain Methvens, where he oversaw the introduction of the first
in-store fair trade café and studio theatre, and then at Book Club Associates,
where he was category buyer for fiction and memoirs.
Malcolm and Vanessa launched The Children's
Bookshop two years ago, a few doors down from the Edinburgh Bookshop. Earlier
this year it was shortlisted for Scottish Independent Bookshop of the Year and
it is currently on the shortlist as Children's Independent Bookshop of
the Year in the prestigious Bookseller Retail Awards. They also opened a
children's illustration gallery, the Fidra Gallery, which was temporarily
housed in what has now become the Edinburgh Bookshop.
Vanessa Robertson said:
‘Moving away from the recent trend
of homogenous book superstores, we hope to go back to the core values of
bookselling - with the bookseller as expert, and the customer as king. In
these recessionary days people are still reading books, and we want to provide
a first-class service for those people. Andrew Bentley-Steed has the perfect
credentials to do this and we are delighted to be working with him.
We are enormously proud to be
opening a new bookshop in what is after all a UNESCO World City of Literature
- and just round the corner from some of the most renowned authors in the
UK, if not the world.‘
The Edinburgh Bookshop is at 181 Bruntsfield Place, Edinburgh
EH10.
Open seven days a week 10.00am to 6pm Mon to Sat, and
12-5pm on Sundays.
Further information can be
found at www.edinburghbookshop.com including details about events at the shop,
a book review page and blog.
The Children's
Bookshop, located just a few doors along from the Edinburgh Bookshop at 219 Bruntsfield Place,
is Edinburgh's
only specialist bookshop for children. It has been shortlisted for
Children's Independent Bookshop of the Year, the winner of which
will be announced as part of the Bookseller Retail Awards on 17th September.
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