Harringay, Haringey - So Good they Spelt it Twice!
The Big Green Bookshop - needs your help!
This from the Big Green Bookshop blog;
We absolutely love it here at the Big Green Bookshop. These have been the most rewarding 3 years of our working lives and we really don’t want it to end. The decision to open came about when the Waterstone’s we managed in the shopping centre was suddenly closed with little warning. The public outcry at this decision made our minds up. After a lot of effort, a considerable amount of help from some amazing people, our redundancy money and a large loan from the bank for our stock and the building, we finally opened the Big Green Bookshop on March 8th 2008.
It’s just that we can’t really afford to have another nine months like the nine we just had, and despite all your amazing support we are struggling.
It was always our aim to try and be more than just a shop where you buy books, and since we opened we’ve tried to offer something for everyone:
- Author events including Will Self, Mark Billingham, David Vann, Karen Maitland, Christopher Fowler, Laura Dockrill, Magnus Mills and even Maisy Mouse!
- Musical evenings, film nights and historical walks
- Well over 300 visits so far to the local schools in Haringey, Enfield and Barnet helping them to promote literacy with author visits, talks, storytelling and whatever else we can.
- Monthly knitting groups, quizzes, writers groups and board games days (and we’re about to start a comedy night.)
- Two book groups.
- Weekly storytelling and singing for the under 5’s.
- Supporting local talent by holding book launches, poetry readings and talks by the cream of North London’s literary stars.
- Even a place to leave your shopping if it gets too heavy and to sit down with a free cup of tea or coffee.
The list could go on, but we hope you get the idea.
We sincerely hope that you want The Big Green Bookshop to remain here and value what we do and so we are asking for your help.
Our bank loan now has nine months to go until it’s paid off. This is our biggest single outgoing each month. Once the loan has been paid off we will be in a relatively stable position.
We want to address the short term issues and also the longer term ones, so;
Firstly
As our last newsletter announced, we’d like to set up The Big Green Bookshop Committee which will support the bookshop, offering suggestions & ideas to improve what we do for our customers in the future. The first meeting is this Sunday February 27th at 11am. Please come along.
Secondly
It’s the 3rd Anniversary of the Bookshop on March 8th. During the week 6th to 12th March we’re asking you all to buy just one extra book from the Big Green Bookshop. We have over 1,000 people on our loyalty card scheme & many of you who are reading this who aren’t. If each of you bought one extra book this would pretty much guarantee our survival.
For those of you who cannot make it into the bookshop, but want to help, we take orders over the phone or on our website, and we’ve also set up a ‘donate now’ button on our blog if you have all the books you need but would still like to help us out.
We have some of the greatest customers in the world and we are constantly humbled by the support you show us.
Thanks for reading this message.
Simon, Tim and Mark
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Alison P on
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Gutted to read this. Wish I could think of anything helpful except BUY BOOKS FROM THE BIG GREEN AND NOT FROM AMAZON!
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Permalink Reply by Maddy on
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Also I think Amazon are registered in Luxembourg and thus probably not paying UK tax, along with all those other big corporations.
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That's why I edited it - I've actually stopped shopping from Amazon since I noticed this!
I thought the point of having the facility to edit a comment is so that you have some control over it - frankly I'm a bit annoyed that you think it's OK to just repeat what I first wrote.
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Hi Pamish
The comment you refer to seems to have gone but just to say that the edit facility does not change the text that appears on the home page, even though it does change your post on the actual page.
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Thanks Alison, It was me who complained as I felt points were being scored at my expense. We're all just doing our best here, after all, in a complicated situation.
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Permalink Reply by pamish on
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If the bank loan is at a very high rate of interest, it could be possible to replace this with loans from supportive individuals. As they are unlikely to risk losing savings, it's possible to do a preferential investor contract. I don't know how it's done, but the people at First Out cafe set up like this years ago, there may be someone there still who knows the ropes. Loads of us put in sums of £500, either each or in little groups, and got it back five (?) years later. Good grief it was 25 years ago, now I look them up.
This of course only helps if the cost of the loan is punitive.
As I only visit Wood Green in emergencies, sorry that I can't casual-shop there. But will see you tomorrow at my pal Liz's book launch.
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Permalink Reply by matt on
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Will be interesting to see if there is a flood of support for The BGB on here .... from those that actually use their shop rather than just support it in principal.
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Permalink Reply by David Barry on
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Its a fair point; I am hardly ever near it myself.
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Permalink Reply by StephenBln on
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@pamish I used to enjoy going there too! Centuries ago now! one at least..
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Permalink Reply by Ruth on
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I have to go to WG today (eek) so will stop by and buy something plus will forward this to people not on HoL but are book lovers. Seems like they are playing the role of a community centre, doing lots of stuff for free, for all generations. Hey! Dave C PM, the big society is here and trying to do something! Why dont you support such ventures!!???
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It depends on the nature of the bank loan. Are they allowed to pay it off early?
if so, given that interest rates on savings are so low, it would be possible for some of us to lend money that we have on deposit to the bookshop on the basis that we get paid what we would have been paid on our deposit and the difference between the bank interest and the interest on our loan be used to further repay the bank loan early.
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Permalink Reply by Katy Mendes on
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It is awful to hear of the troubles. Independent bookshops are a treasure, and it would be tragic to see yet another one bite the dust.
I have to admit I haven't been to the BGB but have heard tonnes of good things about it. I'm making a mental note, nay promise, to visit you with my daughter (whose bookwormish tendencies are only now coming to light) within the next couple of weeks.
Wishing you the very best of luck.
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