History
Among the cultural functions of print, bookselling completes a process
that begins with printing and continues with publishing. It follows that
the histories of these three components are closely related.
In New Zealand the
shape of bookselling has been influenced especially by the settlement of
the country which began long after the publishing of books and
newspapers had been established in the countries of emigration. The
impulse to improve their prospects that prompted immigrants to action
also involved further education and the early days of settlement were
characterised by the proliferation of libraries and a variety of
educational institutions. This desire for knowledge and the consequent
need for books was formalised to some extent by the Education Act 1877,
and by the mid 1880s almost three-quarters of the country's population
of about half a million could read and write.
In such an environment
bookselling looked to have a good future. Providing material for
learning, replacing books that had to be sold to help finance
emigration, and offering literary consolation for the isolation from a
culture left behind, guaranteed a flourishing trade. From 1850, when
Charlotte Godley and her husband rarely encountered the treat of new
books, to 1872, when Anthony Trollope on a visit commented on the small
towns with libraries, and stated that 'Carlyle, Macaulay and Dickens are
certainly better known to small communities in New Zealand than they are
to similar congregations of men and women at home', the availability of
books had increased rapidly. However, given that in 1890 20% of the
population lived in the four main centres and that the remainder were to
be found in country settlements, bookselling was for the most part a
function of general retail establishments. Similarly, circulating
libraries, which usually existed as one facet of a retailer's activity,
were a feature of commercial life from the 1860s.
The commercial
manifestation of print culture was also found in the development of
religious bookshops. This followed naturally from the country's
church-sponsored settlements and the evangelical spirit in general. The
Presbyterian Bookroom chain, the British and Foreign Bible Society's
depots along with Catholic and Methodist bookshops were established and
have continued for the most to the present. A Christian Booksellers'
Association was formed in 1974.
In addition to
bookshops, auctioneering contributed to making books available from the
earliest days of settlement. Stock, both new and secondhand, would be
ordered from England. In 1877 J.H. Bethune & Co. was established
in Wellington and this signified a more specialised approach to
auctioneering, servicing not only the general population with overseas
publications but also the bibliophile and archival libraries with rare
New Zealand volumes and manuscripts.
The latter decades of
the 19th century saw the continuing growth of the country's population
with particular consequences for the world of print. Following upon the
Education Act 1877 the publishing and selling of educational books
increased substantially and the rapid extension of the railway system
through Julius Vogel's public works programme produced a network of
railway station bookstalls. By the end of the century, larger
bookselling firms were beginning to feature, the obvious example being
Whitcombe & Tombs, which originated in Christchurch and began to
buy up other businesses elsewhere in New Zealand. G.H. Bennett and Co.
of Palmerston North, established in 1891, and Carthew's bookshop,
established in Feilding in 1879, were two notable larger businesses,
both incidentally with strong family traditions.
During that part of
the 20th century up to the end of World War II, bookselling was
characterised by the growth of Whitcombe & Tombs as a national
chain, the development of London Bookshops as a small chain which
included lending libraries, and the growth of a number of solid
independents. This period also saw the rise of political bookshops and
their eventual replacement from the 1960s by the emergence of specialist
bookshops which represented the later and continuing development in
bookselling. These specialisations include women's studies (Kate
Sheppard Bookshop, Christchurch, and Women's Bookshop, Auckland), ethnic
interests (Pasifika Books, Auckland), children's books (Dorothy Butler,
Auckland, among others), technical and medical publications,
environmental studies, astrology, alternative life style and new age
material. Somewhat more general specialists include Scorpio Books in
Christchurch, the various university bookshops—apart from
their textbook stock—and Unity Books in Wellington and
Auckland. The Australian chain of Dymocks has opened shops in Auckland,
Wellington and elsewhere since 1994, challenging the Whitcoulls/London
Bookshops virtual monopoly in the general bookshop business.
The other main
development in the distribution of print in book form is that of
wholesaling, which has a much shorter history than that of retailing.
Until World War II there were no wholesale bookselling
establishments such as exist at present. Importation had been undertaken
since the 1870s by a few of the more enterprising booksellers until
agents appointed by overseas publishers began calling on booksellers
with publishers' lists, obtaining orders and sending them on to their
principals. Eventually some publishers decided to carry wholesale stock
in New Zealand in addition to supplying books direct to booksellers
(i.e. filling orders obtained by agents). Among those who established a
wholesale presence were Collins (now HarperCollins), Penguin Books,
Hodder and Stoughton (now Hodder Moa Beckett), William Heinemann, and
Hutchinson. Firms set up to represent publishers were Hicks Smith,
Oswald-Sealy and Leonard Fullerton Ltd. Altogether a good range of
British publishing was made available in this way. Random House and
Transworld Publishers are recent significant additions to the number of
larger wholesalers.
The wholesaling of New
Zealand publications was for a long time mainly in the hands of
Whitcombe & Tombs and A.H. & A.W. Reed, but by the 1990s
the former (now called Whitcoulls) had ceased wholesaling, and Reeds had
been taken over by an international company, although still wholesaling.
The place of these two firms pre-eminent since the 1970s had steadily
been superseded by a growing number of smaller companies wholesaling a
much wider range of material. The wholesale supplies of magazines, as
distinct from books, was for many years largely in the hands of Gordon
& Gotch. This firm, which had humble beginnings in the Victorian
goldfields in the 19th century, became the dominant supplier to both
newsagents and booksellers in Australia and later throughout New
Zealand. Competition in recent times has broadened the range of titles
and added numerous international newspapers. One recent development has
been the stocking of magazines (alongside paperbacks) by supermarkets.
There were two other
factors that influenced the decision to hold local wholesale stock. The
first was import licensing imposed in the 1930s and in place until 1963.
Licences set limits to a bookseller's capacity to import books and
represented a restriction on his business. New licences and increases to
existing licences were difficult to obtain, resulting in wholesalers
being turned to more and more. The second factor was that for some years
there had been an increasing number of accounts opened by local
booksellers with overseas publishers and these were proving to be
uneconomic to service.
From this arose closed
market operations which required that some titles or imprints be
purchased by the bookseller only from a New Zealand wholesaler while
other books not necessarily stocked in New Zealand could still be
imported. Both means of supply were effected by orders taken from the
bookseller by the wholesaler's representative, or by orders initiated by
the bookseller. The 1990s has seen the loosening of some of these
arrangements and the increasing use of overseas wholesalers by a number
of more innovative booksellers. Electronic technology and less costly
air freight has provided a global aspect to bookselling not possible
until the last few years. Books from virtually anywhere are expected to
be supplied quickly, and this has put new demands on both wholesaler and
retailer. These changes have also put pressure on market rights, a
system whereby an originating publisher, say in the United States, would
sell the right to publish a title to a British publisher who would be
entitled to sell it in Commonwealth countries without competition from
the American edition. This system, which was modified during and after
the 1970s because of its restrictiveness and monopoly implications,
continues nevertheless to influence book importing.