Beattie & Forbes: There’s a Grand Piano in my bookshop

Capable go-getters Megan and James Landon, who have owned Napier’s Beattie & Forbes since 2005, now have a new attraction in the store: a grand piano they are looking after for the Hawke’s Bay Museum while it is closed for a three year rebuilding programme.

Better still, the piano was played regularly at lunchtimes in the museum, and the same tradition is being maintained at Beattie & Forbes. (see below).

Imagine a grand piano in most bookshops you know, and the result would be like an elephant in the room. But since Beattie & Forbes moved to bigger premises in Tennyson Street at the end of 2009, they had the space and were looking to hold more functions in store.

Musical soirees are now a possibility and in fact they hosted two of the events of the first Napier City Showcase featuring singer songwriter Annah Mac and Chanelle Davies on piano (below).

Book Launches

However, a book launch was the main promotion being held this week, with 100 people in store for the launch of local author Adele Broadbent’s teen novel Just Jack. Megan has more news involving Adele - she will shortly join the staff. In fact Adele has already been hosting a popular book club for tweens held at 5.30 on the first Tuesday of every month. (The tweens are growing up, so there will also be a Beattie & Forbes teen book club shortly.)

However, a book launch was the main promotion being held this week, with 100 people in store for the launch of local author Adele Broadbent’s teen novel Just Jack. Megan has more news involving Adele - she will shortly join the staff. In fact Adele has already been hosting a popular book club for tweens held at 5.30 on the first Tuesday of every month. (The tweens are growing up, so there will also be a Beattie & Forbes teen book club shortly.)
Other promotions Beattie & Forbes run are a regular book club held each month in two sessions: wine and cake in the evening for around 12 regulars and more people who come because the book interests them; a morning meeting the next day for those who don’t like to go out in the evening. Megan reckons the cake is a big attraction – her mother is the baker and never makes the same cake twice! But it can be tough on the morning session if there is no cake left over.
They also have occasional rep evenings for their customers and are getting ready for an evening dedicated to school librarians.   

IMAGE: The crowd at Beattie & Forbes for a Max Cryer event.

Other promotions Beattie & Forbes run are a regular book club held each month in two sessions: wine and cake in the evening for around 12 regulars and more people who come because the book interests them; a morning meeting the next day for those who don’t like to go out in the evening.

Megan reckons the cake is a big attraction – her mother is the baker and never makes the same cake twice! But it can be tough on the morning session if there is no cake left over.

They also have occasional rep evenings for their customers and are getting ready for an evening dedicated to school librarians.

Learning-on-the-job booksellers

Hard work has resulted in progress for the English/New Zealand couple who loved the Hawkes Bay lifestyle and settled there in 2003. As a former electrical retailer James had an appropriate work background, but it was a huge career shift for Megan, an epidemiologist who had previously lectured at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine.

There’s not much call for her expertise in the ‘Bay, says Megan, though she does occasional consulting work.

The shift to new premises was the right one, the couple believe. They are in a part of Napier that has a lot of specialist independent retailers, and in the midst of Art Deco buildings on the tourist trail.

IMAGE: Megan and James in the bookshop.

Megan said the previous location in Emerson Street was “too chain store oriented” and that they now have a bigger clientele since the move. They’ve also picked up more tourist business for books on New Zealand

Megan plans a month long local history titles promotion later in the year, as she finds there is a good audience for the genre.

Specialist stock areas

Beattie & Forbes specialise in art, fashion and architecture as well as music titles and cook books. They have a solid nonfiction section – more science and commentary than business titles, says Megan, and sell a lot of biographies.

Literary fiction is the star category. They also bring in books from overseas wholesalers for titles which customers can’t find elsewhere, the only bookseller in Napier to provide this service.

Current recommendations

So what are Beattie & Forbes handselling right now?

“It sounds a bit dated,” says Megan "but Burnt Shadows by Kamila Shamsie, Emma Donoghue’s Room, Anne Michael’s Fugitive Pieces and The Winter Vault. Markus Zuzak’s The Book Thief seems to be in the third wave of popularity, and we also sell a lot of crime.”

Megan says they are well looked after by reps for reading copies. “I just discovered Dash and Lily’s Book of Dares (Rachel Cohn and David Levithan) after I picked up the book at random from the reading pile and now I’m ordering it and recommending it. There’s some fantastic teen fiction out there.”

Megan and James both do the buying, and James gets the backroom receiving task as well as spending at lot of time at the counter, while Megan wrestles with the office work in between customers. They are fortunate to have invaluable assistance from Kathleen Cocking who has been with the business for 25 years.

The next generation of Landon booksellers?

With four boys aged from 14 to seven (“In three different schools,” groans Megan) the Landon’s have made the choice to employ someone to work Saturdays and Sundays so they get at least one mutual day off.

It seems there is likely a new bookselling dynasty in the making: 14 year old Patrick will cheerfully recommend books to school friends (and customers if he is in the store) and 11 year olds Jack and Felix are keen readers.

Seven year old Wilf will go and read read Moomintroll books when he is in store and recommends Not A Stick (Antoinette Portis), telling anyone who will listen that it is a book they should have!