Brenda Channer is passionate about books and is excited to share this enthusiasm with as many people as possible. She tells me that she wants her bookshop, Martinborough Books and Post, to be a strong part of the Martinborough community.
A year after she took ownership of the shop in 2022, she incorporated the NZ Post agency into the business because she thought that in this way, a wider part of the community would come through the doors and be exposed to her extensive display of books.
It is this innovation to draw in a wider community that won Brenda the Bookshop of the Year Award at the recent Aotearoa Book Industry Awards.
Renee Rowlands, manager of the Booksellers Association of Aotearoa, made the comment, “Brenda has thought outside the box to secure a future for the store in a difficult trading environment.”
But it’s not just the shop’s innovation in diversifying that helped secure the award. The judges said that “Martinborough Books and Post is an exceptional provincial bookstore, skilfully curating a selection of books to a vast community.”
Brenda attended the awards ceremony in Auckland and was surrounded by fellow booksellers from all over New Zealand. She tells me how they work together, particularly in the Wellington region, in a really co-operative and supportive way. “We are a community.” On the evening, the Best Bookseller award was the very last to be announced. “There was an exciting build up to it and I didn’t know who would win.
However, when the announcer starting using words that I had put in my application I realised that it must be me.”
Looking around me in the shop I commented to Brenda on the large amount of stock she held. She responded that it is all carefully worked out as to which books are chosen and how many of each are ordered. “It’s the choosing that’s the skill.” She and her staff know their stock well and respond to customers’ requirements with recommendations and special orders. Brenda feels that it’s the construction of the building and the space they occupy that gives the shop such a good feeling. This is coupled with the way the books are laid out to allow for easy browsing.
Another innovative way that customers will be enticed into the shop is a series of events planned for August as part of the Pour and Explore festival. Each Friday evening local guest speakers will be presenting different aspects of writing and books. There will be crime writers, novelists, poets and bookbinders. Brenda has many more ideas up her sleeve for encouraging people to visit the shop and make it even more part of the local community than it already is.
