The largest bookstore in Spain only wants safe bets

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"No one has sold more books in Spain than El Corte Inglés. Some centers have had a lot of background and highly qualified personnel: Goya, Princesa, Diagonal, Plaza de Cataluña ... They were shops with a good reputation. But, right now, I doubt that El Corte Inglés does

. Its bookstores are basically a succession of novelty tables plus some shelves ... There is no bet on having a good catalog in store. "

The description comes from a Madrid bookseller with experience in representing his trade union, but it could be signed by any consumer who passes through the centers of La Castellana, Sanchinarro, Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, Marbella ... Part of the space that previously occupied books are now dedicated to jewelry, stationery, merchandising of television series ... Even vinyl has gained space.

In some centers, the books have left the street plant, the most valuable.

And

.

A clarification: El Corte Inglés is a private company whose priority at this time of crisis is to

.

No need to review it again.

But for the cultural industry it is a little drama to lose a showcase such as that of its bookstores, which in the 1980s sold 18% of the books in Spain.

"For us, selling in El Corte Inglés is the most difficult thing, more than in any other chain," explains the editor of an independent label.

"Her criteria are fast-paced," adds a colleague, a publisher specializing in popular history books.

"They see the catalog, they detect the titles that offer them some commercial certainty and

."

"We would like to know what books are going to be sold," reply sources from El Corte Inglés.

His message is simple.

First: the space in the centers

.

There are centers in which the bookstores go to less and others in which they go to more, as in Goya's, in Madrid, where the books have gone to

.

The company says that its bookstores, as a whole, have not lost linear sales space.

In addition, they explain, El Corte Inglés has not abandoned the cultural market.

It has moved it to the internet, where

.

"El Corte Inglés has a good network sales infrastructure, although it is not a leader", explain industry sources.

"They have the advantage that it works a lot with

[the copy is only manufactured if there is a purchase order], so there is no storage cost."

Some more explanations.

The book is a low-profit product: 30% is for the seller.

In return, the product turnover is high.

A good customer returns every 10 days.

“That's why you will see that department stores cross-sell.

which will surely make more money, “explain sources from AECOC, the Association of Manufacturers and Distributors.

What is the reason for this bookstore move?

In part, it responds to the crisis of department stores in Europe.

During the last years, the turnover of El Corte Inglés has grown below the Spanish GDP, but its profits increased at a good speed.

In a highly competitive sector, the company has been

-

for

years

to focus on those that are going well: food, space rental for luxury firms ... The bookstore is not in the mix.

And, in part, it responds to the aspect of the book market in 2020. "The rapid turnover of the product is not something that happens only in El Corte Inglés, it is everywhere," explains the Barcelona-based head of a book distributor .

«The people who attend the purchasing center are still the same, they know about books.

It is the business that has become impatient.

In London, Harrod's doesn't have a bookstore;

the German Kaufhaus, either.

, but it does not have them in other stores.

In the United States, the Barnes & Noble bookstore chain is eternally sick about its future, it is speculated almost permanently ...

And in Spanish cities, the FNAC stores also seem

, despite the fact that sources from the French company assure that the space reserved for books remains stable at around 20 or 25% of the total surface.

His latest starts, they say, have had an even higher percentage.

By the way: the appearance of the FNAC in the 90s and the expansion of La Casa el Libro were

for the sale of books in Spain and two good competitors for El Corte Inglés.

It was a time when there was talk of the

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