Bluecoat Bookshop

By Colin Serjent

"Reading is still one of life's pleasures," said Paul McCue, owner of the Bluecoat bookshop, when I recently met him at their re-located premises at the Gostins Building in Hanover Street, having moved there after being based at the Bluecoat Arts Centre for 16 years.
This is also evidently the case with the many thousands of customers who regularly visit the shop to peruse and purchase some of the very diverse range of titles stocked there. They also receive customer orders for books from all round the world.
"We are very different from mainstream bookshops," stated McCue. "We are not led by trends or fashions in the book trade.
"In the space we have here at Gostins (20% more than at the Bluecoat) no mainstream bookseller can match the vast array and choice of books we have on offer." he added.
The shop has approximately 12,000 titles on display with another 25,000 held in storage. 40% of them are imported in from the USA and Canada.
"One reason we have to go through this route is because British book publishers will not sell off books at a discount in this country," explained McCue, who visits New York, Toronto and Chicago three time a years to deal with the selection of books to be transported to Liverpool.
I often visit the shop and I consider it to be special because of its refreshing and laid back attitude to the way it sells books, all sold at a discount of the recommended retail price, together with the way they value their customers - they are not just regarded as consumers who buy books.
What is particularly fascinating about spending time there is the possibility of picking up a gem of a book, perhaps never before available in this country. But beware if there is only one copy in stock! If you decide to put off buying it for a couple of days, you will find that someone else in the meantime will have bought it.
"I realise that people will have to get into the habit of visiting us in our new location," said McCue, "but we are confident that we can attract a similar level of visitors to the shop that we had in the Bluecoat. The development of major retail outlets in the immediate vicinity to us, which s part of the Paradise Street Redevelopment Project, will also help bring in more customers."